Fairy Days
by SmirkJr
Summary: The Eclipse Gate opening brought enough trouble. Ultear tried to fix it with the fatal spell, but someone stopped her... sort of. This is what happens when a mysterious new stranger interferes and things get interesting. This is my time travel fic. Rating may change. Cover image found on Pinterest, then edited. May later be rated M, but I need more voters on the poll to be certain.
1. Prologue: Life and Death

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail

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Natsu of Fairy Tail was-

Ah, screw the formal language. He was basically running around constantly looking upward, following the future bastard that was currently controlling the seven dragons that walked through Eclipse. Said future bastard was being flown above the city by Motherglare, who could have been easily dubbed "The Adamantium Dragon" for how thick its skin was. Natsu was getting annoyed; on one hand, he didn't have enough magic power to fly up there by blasting flames through his feet, but on the other hand, running around was getting him nowhere. Plus, he would really like to avoid running into too many more walls...

Suddenly, amidst all the dust, rubble, and other scents, he picked up a familiar one, causing him to jerk his head back towards the ground in front of him. "Gah!" Instinctively, he turned towards the scent just before he hit the half-standing wall of what appeared to have once been a jail (seeing as there were metal bars and bricks everywhere). He ran until he came to a bit of a clearing in the rubble as a nearby clock tower chimed the hour in the distance, and he froze at what he saw. Not out of shock, but confusion.

In front of him, he saw familiar hair and heard a familiar voice.

"If this will set things right, then so be it!" Her hands were surrounded in rainbow magic.

He suddenly remembered her name. "Ultear, what are you doing?!"

He made it just in time. The spell simply broke alongside Ultear's concentration on channeling magic.

"Natsu? What are you doing here?" she asked. She seemed worried to him, but he put this aside in his head.

"Trying to find a way to get back up to that flying bastard!" he answered bluntly, showing his frustration. His expression softening, he then asked, "What about you?"

Ultear hesitated for a moment. On one hand, she kind of figured he would disagree strongly with her casting the spell she was preparing to cast moments earlier. On the other hand, she would never forgive herself for her many sins if she didn't at least try her best to help save the world. After that moment of deliberation, however, she remembered he would definitely interfere if she cast the spell whether she told him about it or not.

"I... I tried killing present Rogue." Seeing he was waiting for the rest, she continued, "But I was able to stop myself. Then I walked around a bit, and..." She started tearing up. "Natsu, I haven't changed at all. Before, I used to kill innocent human beings without a second thought, thinking that nothing I did would matter in the end, fooled by the idea of the Grand Magic World. I saw the error of my ways, and I founded Crime Sorciere, but... I still tried to kill an innocent man... again..." Here, Ultear finally lost her control and started to sob. Not melodramatically so, but they could still be heard. Natsu walked over to her, standing in front of her.

"Is that all?" Natsu asked stoically.

"Yes... that's the basic gist of it. I was just about to rewind time with Last Ages." Ultear was now in control of her tears and sobbing.

"'Last Ages'?" Natsu asked.

"Yeah. It's a spell that rewinds time at the expense of the caster's time. In essence, the caster dies in exchange for turning back time," Ultear explained.

"What?" Natsu asked, half angry, half worried. This rather shocked Ultear, given that she thought he would _completely_ freak out. The silence that followed shocked her further. She had never seen him so pensive before. Finally, he spoke.

"Why?"

His voice was stoic and bordering angry. She thought he was understanding her reasoning, a new feat. She didn't even hear the voice in her head saying that Natsu wouldn't do that. This probably took the cake for shocking her. She expected him not to care about the reason why she was using a fatal spell.

"Why would you take your own life?! I never understood that!" His voice was full-blown indignant now.

Ultear fell back into depression. 'No... I suppose he wouldn't understand... my pain... my reasons... my motivation...' She was sure she was sad he wasn't trying to understand.

"Natsu... I'm thankful to Gray for giving me a second chance... But I must set things right..." (here, rainbow magic enveloped her hands again) "...to atone for my sins!"

"NOOOO!" Natsu ordered.

Just as Ultear's hands were about to hit the ground themselves, a hand pushed each one from above onto the ground. Ultear looked up to see Natsu, and yet... it wasn't Natsu. His eyes were no longer slits, but rather dark circles, charcoal pupils that looked like the abyss had sex with a black hole somehow, and they had a baby somehow, too. He was calmer than before. She looked down to see that the magic hadn't disappeared yet, even though her concentration had been broken. She mentally gasped. 'He's... he's controlling the spell! What is he doing?!'

" **Arc of Time: Total Rewind... X770!** " That voice wasn't Natsu's entirely. There was another voice mixed in there. However, Ultear was just shocked she heard him utter the words to an Arc of Time spell she couldn't find with all her years of research and learning.

"What did you do?!"

The magic energy floating around them suddenly exploded in a flash of light and all people around could see the pillar. Before they were completely enveloped in it, Ultear heard the same double voice that came from Natsu.

It said, "Meet Natsu... in Fairy Tail... Ultear Milkovich... Change history."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

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Yo! Yeah, I was reading a few 'time travel' fics where someone (usually Natsu anyway) travels back in time so they can redo their life. I was thinking of making this when I read the good ones (some examples are 'Time is the Path to Strength' by Repiece or 'Last Ages' by dude932) and I think this chapter turned out pretty well, despite being short. Anyway, reviews are welcome. See ya next time!


	2. Ch 1: Training: Devil Slaying and Tarot

Yo! Quick note: I kinda had to fool around with Ultear's birthday a little. They never mentioned it anyway, so I hope you don't mind.

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.

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Ultear woke up with a start. Mainly because she felt like something was different. She saw she was in an alley. She looked around, seeing a creepy-ish guy sitting on a crate on the dead-end side. She then looked to the entrance and saw that no-one was moving.

"What the heck happened?" Ultear was now minimally alert. She ran out to the street, looking left and right. Nobody was moving, nothing was in motion. She ran around a few feet from the entrance, seeing the same all around. She walked to a guy near the entrance. He was about her age... yet...

"These guys are really tall... and so are all those people walking about in the streets... what happened?"

Then she remembered everything. Telling Natsu what she was doing, almost casting Last Ages, Natsu taking over the spell and casting something entirely different. Total Rewind, he had called it.

'Hmm...' Ultear looked down and gasped. The first thing she noticed was that her hair no longer draped down her shoulders. The second was that her chest had shrunk to the point of 'undeveloped'. Next, she noticed how she was wearing different clothes, just her size. Kind of creepy.

"Am I... younger?" This was meant to be rhetorical.

"Yep."

Hearing that response behind her, she turned and saw that the man sitting on the crate was the speaker. He had jeans and a t-shirt, as well as an armband that looked eerily similar to something else she had seen before. His hair was a wild red and his eyes were a ghostly purple and he was smiling delicately, so as not to come off as creepy or goofy (because meeting a creepy guy in an alley is so cliché and meeting a goofy guy is worse). The two just sat in silence for a minute. Neither of them made a move.

"What's going on here? Nobody's moving," Ultear asked cautiously.

"We are currently the only moving people on the planet right now. Time has frozen. I can maintain this all day to explain, so ask away," he said kindly. Ultear hesitated again, thinking of where to start.

"Who are you?" Ultear eventually asked.

"Me? Well, my name's Kai. I'm the one who brought you back in time." He was calm, as if that was perfectly normal, or at least nothing to be alarmed about.

"'Brought us back in time'?" she asked incredulously.

"What? You didn't seriously think Natsu knew the Arc of Time better than you, did you?" He was smiling.

"How do you know Natsu's name?" she asked, worried and alert.

"I brought you both back in time with Total Rewind. That spell, an Arc of Time spell of my own invention, allowed me to bring you back in time, and your memories remained intact with me while I did the spell. I just _had_ to glean your names from your memories before I gave them back because I figured you'd want me not to address you as 'little girl' and him as 'little brat'. The drawback is that everyone other than the caster and targets is sent forward in time the same amount that the targets and caster are sent back. And, trust me, I was there when the dragons attacked. Luckily, I was able to protect them all... well, kinda," he explained.

"'Kind of'? What is that supposed to mean?" Ultear questioned, now less uncomfortable and more confused.

"Well... I also use the Arc of Spirits. It's a Lost Magic, too. One of the most basic spells allows you to put a 'tag' on a person that brings their spirit to you once they die. I tagged everyone involved in the Grand Magic Games and Eclipse. Evidently, they all died within the 21 years they were sent to the future. The Arc of Spirits also allows me to place the spirits I gather in my mind, more specifically the imagination, which they have the ability to utilize for living, training, and anything else. In essence, Fairy Tail, Crime Sorciere, and all other guilds involved in the Grand Magic Games are now in here," he pointed to his head, "safe and sound, along with a couple of other people. They theoretically could manifest themselves in the outer world," he gestured to the alley they were in, "but they couldn't make a physical body since they don't belong in this time."

"So... Jellal and Meredy and Natsu... are all dead?" she asked cautiously, her voice shaking.

"Technically, Jellal and Meredy from _your_ time are dead. But Jellal of this time is alive, albeit younger, Meredy of this time hasn't been born yet, but probably will be, and Natsu is right there." He gestured to the sleeping Natsu whom she only just noticed. Ultear looked down in sadness, then at the sleeping six-year old Natsu.

"But, wait... how is that possible? He was only 17," Ultear noted.

"Technically speaking, those bodies you and Natsu have are from this time, but you are technically not the Natsu and Ultear of this time. They are now spectators in your head. Young Ultear is probably watching right this very minute from inside your imagination, wanting to talk, to find out what is happening. However, to talk to her, you will have to learn how to reach her with Telepathy. They don't have access to magic, but they can see and feel all the things you experience. They will grow up just like normal. They will just have a... weird childhood. Oh, by the way, you should have all the magic you had at the Grand Magic Games."

"Oh, right. Wait, how is that possible?" Ultear asked with curiosity in her voice, tilting her head, causing him to laugh. She pouted. "Hey, what's so funny?"

"Oh, sorry. I just find you very adorable. Anyway, to answer your question, I preserved your magic with the spell. To my credit, magic is a lot easier to contain and store using magic. I returned it to you while you were unconscious," Kai explained.

"This is all a lot to process," Ultear noted, falling on her rump exhaustedly.

"Take your time. However, I brought you back to the past for a reason. If we take too long waiting, how are we going to save Ur in four years?"

This made Ultear start. She stood up immediately.

"Seriously? We can save my mother?" Ultear asked in shock. She then felt even more alert.

"Yeah. Ur sealed away Deliora in X774 in your timeline. We didn't change anything before that. That gives us four years. I suppose we should soon start training," Kai responded.

"'Training'?" Ultear asked, confused.

"Yeah. How else are you going to kill Deliora? If you don't, she will still seal it away with Iced Shell," Kai asked rhetorically.

"What? 'Kill Deliora'? How?" Ultear inquired, shocked again, though in an entirely different way.

"Well, there is a magic that exists solely for the purpose of killing demons: Devil Slayer Magic. I'm sure you can connect the dots," he answered.

"'Devil Slayer Magic'? Wow. Interesting," Ultear noted. Then she turned back to him, "Wait, why don't you kill Deliora? You clearly know how."

"Well... I can't."

"Why not?"

"Simple. I don't have the power available to kill Deliora. In fact, you and Natsu should be among the only ones who can currently see me or hear me, since the Arc of Spirits turned me into an ethereal manifestation. Only those who have interacted with me can see me. Using Total Rewind drained my magic reserves quite a bit, but at least the interaction enabled you to see me. Anyway, what do you say? Do you want to learn Devil Slayer Magic?"

Ultear paused. On one hand, she would be delighted to save her mother and undo all her past sins like she wanted, but on the other hand... well, she had no idea what else there was to it.

"Why not... At least I can see my mother again..." Ultear responded.

"Good. Now we just wait for Natsu to wake up." He looked down at the sleeping kid. "He must be a pretty heavy sleeper," he noted, sweat-dropping.

Suddenly, Natsu sneezed and woke up in one instant. He looked around, setting his eyes on the redhead.

"Who're you? What happened? Where am I?" He asked all of these questions consecutively and calmly.

"I guess I have to explain again..." Kai pouted.

"It doesn't look adorable on _you_ , you know," Ultear teased.

After the re-explanation

"That's so cool, old man! You saved our friends and made us six again!" Natsu reacted almost too well.

"Uhhh... didn't you hear the part about needing to kill Deliora?" Ultear asked, sweat-dropping.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, that too," he responded.

Ultear simply rolled her eyes and smiled. She then looked at Kai. "So, what now?"

 **Later, near Ur's house in the mountains...**

Currently, Kai, Ultear, and Natsu were all shivering up in the mountains, walking towards Ur's house, a fire lit courtesy of Mr. Fire-Breath. Kai just explained that he would be living in Magnolia, sending a Thought Projection to each of them so that they could learn Devil Slayer Magic while 'little' Ultear was re-learning Ice Make magic and 'little' Natsu was 'learning' Dragon Slayer Magic.

"Why Ice-Make Magic?" Ultear had asked.

"You already learned the Arc of Time, and you will learn Ice Devil Slayer Magic, so practicing with another Ice Magic is a good idea. You know, so you can get the feel for it again. You already know a little, don't you?" he explained.

"I see your point. Very well, I am ready to practice Ice Make Magic once I get back from the experiment. In the meantime, I'm going to train physically," Ultear conceded.

"All right! And I'm ready to make Igneel train me harder than before! I'm all fired up now!" Natsu yelled, grinning.

"Not so loud, Natsu. Time is still frozen, but that doesn't change the fact that we are extremely far away from where you grew up with Igneel. If I lose my concentration, time will unfreeze and he will wonder how you suddenly disappeared without a trace. Do you want him to worry?" Kai lectured.

"Well... no," Natsu said, downtrodden. Ultear looked at him with sympathy.

"Don't be sad, Natsu. You get to see your father again, even though he has no idea you're from the future." Ultear was comforting him now. She had a hand on his shoulder. He turned his head to look at her. He smiled.

"Yeah, you're right!" Cheered up again, the flame in his hand grew.

"That reminds me, make sure _nobody_ finds out about you being from the future. That could mess things up big time," Kai warned.

"You don't have to tell us!" Natsu fumed comically.

"We're not children," Ultear added.

"How ironic of you to say that _now_ , when you actually _are_ children," Kai joked, before laughing. After his laughter died down (it didn't take long), he stopped walking. "Here we are. Good thing it's nighttime right now. Now, go get some rest, Ultear. Tomorrow, you start to get sick from too much magic power in your little body, especially since your magic was preserved from X791. Remember, you have to endure the experiment that comes soon. Also, remember that the guy who lied to your mother about your condition was actually an evil guy who later led a Dark Guild. Don't mind him now that you know what happened."

"Yeah, I know. See you later, Kai. You too, Natsu." With that, Ultear ran inside the small house.

"Hey, Kai, how long until we get to Igneel's cave?" Natsu asked.

"A loooooong time."

"WHAT?! I don't think I can take the train that long..." Natsu was already almost puking.

"Nope. That's why we're walking. Plus, time is frozen. Vehicles wouldn't move anyway."

 **In a forest...**

"I think we're almost there... though this nose isn't very good..." Natsu commented.

"Well, you are only six. You have a life ahead of you to hone your nose," Kai responded.

They had been walking through the trees for at least an hour... well, what _would've been_ an hour, considering time was frozen and all. They came to a clearing around a cave. They had found what they were looking for.

"I'm back!" Natsu cheered.

"Yes, you are. You should hurry and get to your bed or wherever you sleep. We have a lot of training ahead," Kai advised.

"Okay!" Natsu complied cheerfully. With that, he ran to the cave and disappeared from Kai's sight.

"...Hmm. I think I'll go get an apartment. Preferably one close to where Lucy will live." Kai smiled before walking a different direction.

 **Time then unfroze once Kai made it back to Magnolia (on foot, poor guy). The next day, he had gotten an apartment fairly close to one he knew would be occupied by someone else in a decade or so, Ur took her daughter to the Bureau of Magical Development because of the disproportionately large amount of Magic she possessed, and Natsu went to the trouble of proving to Igneel that he could totally learn the more advanced stuff (after proving he was of a different time) and got started on that right away. Ultear was treated of her symptoms and kidnapped, just like she knew she would be, and she remained calm, aside from the small amount of anger she initially had upon remembering what happened. She spent the free time she had in her cell training in secret with Kai to learn Ice Devil Slayer Magic and the rest in the painful experiments, building up her Magic Container. Natsu snuck into the woods at night to start learning with Kai, who taught him Fire Devil Slayer Magic, which he started to get the hang of easily. Two years passed of this. Ultear escaped at this time, making the grueling journey back to her mother. This time, however, Gray wasn't there yet. Long story short, they had a happy reunion, Ultear explained what happened with her kidnapping, and they decided to spend their newfound time together and with Lyon, with Ultear asking to learn Ice-Make Magic. She decided to spend her remaining time before X774 honing her Ice-Make, Arc of Time, and Ice Devil Slayer Magics (the latter two in secret, of course). Meanwhile, Kai was dealing with something else of importance...**

...

 **X772, in front of the Fairy Tail guild hall...**

"Miss, what are you doing standing there?"

Currently, little Cana was standing in front of her father, who had just noticed her staring at him. She was smiling as he looked down at her.

"F-"

"Hurry back home now," he interrupted her, "stand there too long and your clothes will start to smell like booze." He was walking away as he finished this statement. She was looking on with confusion and sadness, her hand outstretched, as if to reach out for him.

Two months later

Cana was still depressed. Over the past few months, again and again, she had visited the guild hall and, each time, she was disappointed. She even ended up joining Fairy Tail at some point. Today she was in the middle of her usual routine: sitting alone with a mug of juice moping while waiting for her father to come back. Suddenly, she heard the bell of Kardia Cathedral chime and she felt the ground rumble. At this, she watched as everyone ran outside. She got up and did the same, albeit slower. She had to squeeze her way to the front of the gathering crowd before her face became anything but the current 'stoic' look it had on now. She was really surprised at the sight that greeted her.

"The city split!" she observed in amazement.

Macao and Wakaba explained (in a matter of 2 sentences) that Gildarts was returning. However, when everyone (Gildarts included) had come back inside (and the city was normal again), Cana just couldn't muster up the courage to say the now-kind-of-old news to the man that he was her father. Discouraged, she sat in the corner with her head down and her straw in her mouth. She heard the slight and small noise of a card hitting the ground and looked at the ground to find a card. She picked it up and suddenly felt as if she was asleep in a dream. She opened her eyes to find a forest. She was alone.

...Is what she thought until she heard someone behind her say, "Hey."

She suddenly turned her head towards the voice. She saw a man with wild red hair and ghostly purple eyes. Of course, _we_ know it's Kai, but _she_ doesn't.

"Who're you? What happened? Where am I?"

"My name is Kai. I'm the one who dropped the card for you."

"Really? Why'd you do that?" Cana asked.

"I thought you had something on your mind, and I figured you'd want to talk. I had to do this because, long story short, I'm a ghost that can use magic. Only people who've interacted with me can see me, and you touched my Dream Card, so here we are," he explained, gesturing to the dreamlike forest.

"'Dream Card'?" Cana asked.

"Yeah. I put you to sleep and now I'm within your imagination and your subconscious, or, in short, your dream. So, let me guess what's troubling you... you have something you want to tell someone, but you can't work up the courage, huh?"

"That's exactly right," the 6-year-old said, "but how'd you know?"

Kai walked over to her, sat in front of her, and pulled out a card from behind his back. It portrayed Gildarts running out the door while a girl Cana guessed to be herself watched him from the doorway, sad.

He put the card away and quickly explained, "Card Magic," like it was so simple. "That's not the point though. Did you want to talk about it with someone? After all, only bottling up these kinds of things will end up ripping you apart later if we don't talk about it now."

"Well..." Cana looked down. She was hesitating. Looking up, she started with, "I've only just met you, though."

"Not exactly. I've met _you_ before... err, sort of. Well, the point is that I know the situation you're in and I know how hard it is to tell him who you are. I hate to see such pain as the pain I've seen when it comes to these things. I am here to help you."

Cana looked down at the ground for a couple of minutes.

"Well, you probably already know, but there is a mage in Fairy Tail named Gildarts. That man is my father. I came to Fairy Tail to see him, except he didn't recognize me when I first saw him. That was two months ago. And today, I tried telling him, but I... I..." Cana broke down in tears.

"...You couldn't tell him. You were... intimidated," Kai finished for her.

"Huh?" Cana asked, holding back her sobs so she could ask.

"You were scared," Kai explained.

"Yeah... that's right." Cana couldn't hold it back anymore. She was bawling now, and it remained that way for a minute. Then he surprised her by pulling her into a hug.

"Eh? What's this for?" Cana asked, interrupting her sobbing.

"You can cry all you need to in this dream. It's healthy to cry sometimes. It means you can admit you're sad... to yourself, at least. And that's healthy. Just don't stay sad forever, okay? You will have to make a choice: work up the confidence to tell him or live in sadness if you can't. But I know you can. Promise me you'll tell Gildarts you're his daughter, okay? Also, that your mother's name is Cornelia," Kai explained.

"Huh? Why?" The tears were no longer flowing, but the streaks were still there.

"Oh... it's just an important piece of info. He's always concentrated on his work, so he may not remember. He may have forgotten he even _has_ a daughter. But still, tell him, okay?" Kai explained, looking down at her face.

Her breathing steadied, showing that she had stopped sobbing, and she smiled (also closing her eyes). "Okay!" she said happily.

"Good. If it helps, I can teach you the tarot, so you can predict when he comes next," Kai offered, which Cana accepted.

"When you are ready to learn, just tap the front of the card I dropped for you. I may not come right away, but definitely when you're in the guild hall. I'll teach you little by little," Kai explained.

"I wanna start now!" she said excitedly.

Kai chuckled. "Okay, okay."

A few hours later

Cana woke up from her dream with a start. She had learned the basics, at least. There was now a deck of cards similar to the ones they were using for the 'lesson'. She gripped the card in her hand, looking at the front. There was a decorated message on the front side, with a picture of a smiley face and words around it that read 'Don't lose hope, Cana' She smiled, put the card in her bag, and looked around, noticing that most of the guild was gone. She stood up, dusted off the bottom of her skirt, and walked out the door, smiling for the first time in a long time.

 **Over the next two years, Cana continued to learn about the tarot from Kai, until she knew all he could teach her. Even so, she continued to call on him, as a friend. They often chatted in these dreams, but he told her to also try to make friends in Fairy Tail. So she did. And so, her slight crush on Macao Conbolt started. They sat together too, and eventually, Cana showed him the card. They entered that dream together, and came out as close friends. Also, she decided to learn Card Magic after she asked the Master about it one day. He gave her the final push she needed to start learning. Meanwhile, Natsu pushed Igneel for harder training still and Ultear learned alongside Lyon Ice-Make Magic. However, all three of them had stopped needing to learn from Kai over that time. Natsu mastered Fire Devil Slayer Magic, since he has a natural affinity for Fire Magics, Cana learned Card Magic from Kai, going to an advanced level, and Ultear managed to combine Ice Devil Slayer Magic with Ice-Make, composing a new style of Magic, which she was proud of, while also spending time with her mother that she didn't get before. Now, X774 has been long underway, and the time until Deliora will strike is drawing nearer. Natsu and Ultear prepare to head over to the land of Isvan, which is Deliora's next destination...**

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Ta-da! Yeah, so this chapter is mostly training and learning, so I did a little skipping around. This isn't the pace the story will go at, this is just the pace _training_ segments go at. Not many of those in the story. Also, I'm just trying out those little summary segments at the end for just the training chapters, so let me know what you think. Anyway, please review. Bye!


	3. Ch 2: Deliora and Loke and Friends

Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail.

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The past four years were fun for Ultear (well, the past two if you disqualified being experimented on by the Magic Council). She had gotten to talk with Kai, Natsu, and even a new friend named Cana, who was currently about two years her junior (although, mentally, she was, like, 38) via Kai's Dream Cards, which she got from a carrier pigeon, as well as through Thought Projections, which she had taught Natsu and was currently teaching Cana. Now, she knew Ice-Make Magic as well as she did The Arc of Time, and she was able to learn Devil Slayer Magic and combine it with Ice Make Magic. Now, her body was 10, she was pretty close friends with Natsu (alongside Cana and Kai to a lesser extent), and she had befriended Lyon, who had eventually come to learn the story of how Ultear was kidnapped and made it back to Ur (albeit two years ahead of schedule, but only Ultear knew that). In addition, Gray had been learning under Ur for 2 months, training to become stronger to defeat Deliora, and she tried to befriend him once Ur and Lyon had returned. He got along with her right away (once she got over his initial rudeness). Ultear chuckled every time she thought about the utter irony of his situation. He was training to defeat Deliora, but so was she. And _she_ could actually _kill_ Deliora, while also keeping her life. Plus, she knew this was the year Deliora attacked the Land of Isvan. Now, if only she knew where...

Meanwhile, those same four years were particularly edifying for Natsu, though he still didn't know what 'edifying' meant. In addition to becoming the Fire Devil Slayer, he was also able to activate Dragon Force and the Devil Slayer version, Devil Force (hey, all the Slayer magics are fundamentally the same anyway!), at will for a whole two days straight. He managed to topple Igneel once... then he had to re-topple him to get him back on his feet since he also accidentally damaged his wings. Natsu was also particularly excited when he received a Dream Card and got to meet little Cana and to talk to Ultear, who was probably the only one who could completely understand the situation he was in. After all, parent and child were separated from a young age in both cases, not to mention they are the sole time travelers from the whole Eclipse business (besides the magic-wielding ghost Kai). However, at least Igneel sort of understood what it was like seeing him again, and he no longer had to sneak out once Igneel found him training (alone). Kai had also taught Natsu and reminded Ultear (while teaching them Devil Slaying) to only know what to _expect_ to happen. Being time travelers from pretty far in the future, they knew a lot of what would happen, but Natsu had a lot he wanted to change. Kai at least told him that things might not happen exactly as he remembered, so at least he was warned. Plus, they had also received (from Kai) Call Cards so they could be on top of the date, time, and place Deliora would strike. Natsu had asked, "Why do we need to get _this_ ready in the first place?", but Ultear simply smacked him and said, "Why else? To save my mom, you insensitive jerk!" Maybe she was a tsundere? This is my thoughts, not Natsu's, but he was kinda thinking the same thing anyway.

Plus, the now 8-year-old Cana had friends. In addition to Kai, Natsu, and Ultear (though the latter two she perceived to be figments of her imagination, with the others playing along, even though Natsu never really understood that they were setting her up for a big surprise later), she also had Macao, Wakaba, the Master, her father (whenever he arrived in town, which depended on his mission), and, as of February X774, the new member Levy McGarden, a total bookworm. Outside of the Dream Card she always used at night to talk to her friends, she only ever saw Kai on the streets of Magnolia in those two years, but she always just shook her head and said, "No, it can't be him." Boy, was she in for a surprise later, wasn't she...

And, to top it all off, Kai even brought the now-7-year-old Lucy into the conversations by giving her a Dream Card. She didn't have as meaningful of a heart-to-heart as the others, but she still befriended the other four. Like Cana, she perceived the others to be figments of her imagination, but, unlike Cana, she could tell they were a little more... realistic than she could've made them in her head. Of course, she was also told that she can only enter the dream at night, when she wanted to sleep, so she still spent may of her days summoning Aquarius around the house and subsequently paying for it.

Plus, in the middle of the ocean, there was a tower being built on slave labor... And within the tower, there were six friends, five of them little kids, one an old man. One was a scarlet-haired girl who had only known her first name, Erza...

 _X772, the middle of the ocean_

 _She was currently sitting alone in her cell, as it was currently nighttime and, even if she had a cellmate, he/she would be asleep. She herself was lying awake on the ground, lost in her thoughts, of how she was brought to the tower she only heard was called the R-System and forced to work on it tirelessly, with countless others, kids and adults alike. She had been working for over a year now and she was used to the tiring pain of working hard labor, receiving meager scraps for meals, and sleeping on the hard ground._

 _Suddenly, she felt her eyes close suddenly and her head move. The first thing she felt was intense cold, almost like being stuck in an ice cube as dense as metal and about five times colder than normal ice. This prompted her to look around to see what was going on while shivering. She looked down and saw what she assumed to be her body, lifeless. She would have asked what was going on, but she knew there wasn't anyone there anyways. ...Or so she thought._

 _"Don't freak out. You're still alive."_

 _Hearing that voice made her jerk her head up. She saw the man we know as Kai, but she jumped back regardless._

 _"Who are you?" she asked, surprised._

 _"My name is Kai. Don't worry, they're not going to catch us talking in here."_

 _"What do you mean?"_

 _"We're currently in the form of spirits while our bodies are elsewhere. In your case, your body is taking a nap, waiting for your spirit to jump back in. But... I wanted to talk to you. Being here must be pretty harsh," Kai answered._

 _"Yeah, it is..." Erza answered. She sat down. "So, what did you want to talk about?"_

 _"Well, I really just wanted to tell you that I'm giving you a Magic power," Kai told her._

 _"Magic?" Erza became a little gloomy. "I can't use Magic."_

 _"You have a very latent Magic talent as well as some reserves, and this spell isn't very draining. It allows you to become a ghost, as you are now, at will. Your body is currently sleeping, and you get to phase through walls, talk to other ghosts, like the ones currently sleeping inside their bodies, and remain unseen and unheard throughout all of it. Plus, with a little training, you can learn to fly as a ghost," Kai explained._

 _"But I still don't know how to do it. I only have what Grandpa Rob told me."_

 _"And what did he say?" Kai asked._

 _"He said that 'only those who believe in living in harmony with nature' and 'those who believe in the power of magic' can use it."_

 _"And does that hold true for you?" Kai countered._

 _"It does, but... I still don't know how to use it," Erza responded._

 _"Well, then, let me modify the spell for you." With this, the ghost got up, walked over to Erza's body, squatted down, and put his hand on her body's stomach, which caused the spot to glow with Magic energy. "There. Now, it will draw from your reserves automatically while you are using it. I also made it intuitive. Just place your hand on the tattoo I have placed on your belly and whisper the command 'Release.' You will then separate from your body and you will be free to move about as you wish."_

 _"Really? Do you want anything in return?" Erza asked, delighted._

 _"Nope. Besides, you don't have much to give, and I can't do anything with a life, so you don't owe me that, either," Kai responded._

 _"...Who are you?" Erza asked._

 _"Me? I'm Kai." He smiled, making her confused a bit. "By the way, you might want to keep this a secret between you and your friends. And remember my name. I'm sure we'll meet again." Kai then got up, took a stance, and jumped towards the wall, phasing through it. Erza saw through the bars that he was flying away._

Anyways, enough summary and recap. Now, we jump to the day when Deliora rampages through Brago, in the Land of Isvan...

...

 **Ur's house, X774**

"Great."

It was a very snowy night, and there was a warm fire inside Ur's house, but the residents weren't in front of it. Currently, a young Gray Fullbuster was walking through the snow away from her, towards Brago... towards Deliora, while she, Ultear, and Lyon were standing in the doorway, watching. He had just taken off, but Lyon had caught him but couldn't keep him. They had an argument that couldn't dissuade him from going. Now she had to go rescue him from what would inevitably be his death. No problem, right?

"Lyon, let's go follow him. Ultear, stay here," Ur commanded.

"No, I'm coming," she argued.

"But, Ultear, Deliora is too dangerous for you!" Ur's voice couldn't have shown more worry.

"Mom, I'm going to help save Gray. I can take care of myself in combat. Besides, I'll stay back, too," Ultear calmly argued back.

Ur sighed. "You're going to go with us either way, aren't you?" Apparently, Ultear had come off as more calm and laid back than is normal for a little kid whilst spending time with her mother and brothers-in-teaching. She could even remember all the times when Gray and Lyon were scared by how shockingly calm she was, almost... mature. She was always reminded of that thought whenever it happened, and she always chuckled at the irony.

"Yes, I am."

"Oh, fine, you can come too, but stay back. I can't focus on fighting if I have to protect you all," Ur conceded.

"Agreed. Let me just go get my shoes." With that, Ultear went back into her room while Ur and Lyon waited in the snow. When she was safely out of earshot of anyone, she pulled out her Call Natsu Card, smiled at the chibi drawing of Natsu, and activated it.

"Hey, Ultear! What's up?" came the Dragon Slayer's voice from the other end.

"Deliora is attacking. We're leaving Mom's house now, and Deliora is in Brago. We need to hurry. I'll see you there."

"Okay, got it. See you there." Natsu then disconnected. With that, Ultear grabbed her shoes, put them on, and ran to the door, where Ur, Lyon, and she started walking to catch up to Gray while Ur could preserve her magical resources for the next fight.

In the forest, Igneel's cave

" _ **Brago? I can get there, no problem. Get on, Natsu** **,**_ " Igneel commanded. Don't forget, he had learned that the Natsu he had been talking to was from the future, among all the other little details. They had no time to waste, so they got out of the cave in record time, Igneel flying off at a new high for speed, while Natsu tried to hold on (thank God it wasn't a vehicle, he was getting sick just thinking about riding a train in the sky).

 **An hour later, in Brago.**

After Ur's group (Ur, Ultear, Lyon, and Gray) arrived at Brago, which was currently in a shambles because of said rampaging demon, the three kids were staying back, as per her wishes, and Ur was the sole Mage fighting. Of course, Gray had learned that he was no match for Deliora, Lyon was slung over his shoulder, and Ultear was just as calm as always. The townsfolk (a good number of them, at least) had evacuated and watched as Deliora's beams of magic razed their town. Deliora had turned its back to Ur, as she took a breather. She was talking to Gray about why she had come to save him, and was just about to get back into the fight when Lyon woke up and finally found out his delusions about her being the strongest in the world were being challenged indirectly, albeit Ur was the one who said, "How many times do I have to tell you, Lyon? There's always someone better." She couldn't calm him down and he ran towards Deliora, screamed, "If you're not going to give it your all, then I'll just have to do it myself!", and assumed the stance for the fatal spell, Iced Shell, with Ultear on his heels. She tackled him and held his arms behind his back. Ur and Gray ran to catch up to them.

"You idiot! That'll kill you! You can't do that!" she scolded.

"Yes I can! I'm stronger than Ur, and I'm going to prove it! Plus, it's the only spell that can beat Deliora!" he argued.

"I'm not going to let you use it! You're a kid too, you know. We have our whole lives ahead of us to become stronger than Mom. That doesn't mean you have to give it up now!" she argued back.

"Shut up! I can do it!" Lyon shouted, but, before he could break free, Ultear froze his hands behind his back with her more powerful ice, Devil Slayer ice. Among the obvious qualities, it's stronger than just regular ice. He couldn't break free, no matter how hard he tried. He eventually just gave up.

"Ultear's right, Lyon. Didn't you read the rest of that book? Iced Shell turns the caster's body into the Iced Shell itself. You don't have to use that spell. You have your whole life ahead of you." She then bit her lip. "I'll do it. You _were_ right about it being our only choice."

"About that..." Ultear started, making the three of them look at her.

"What is it, Ultear?" Ur asked.

"Could you make a mountain of ice in front of us?" she requested.

"Why?" Gray asked.

"Just do it," Ultear asked.

"I can't, Ultear. I have to use Iced Shell. Otherwise, nobody will be able to stop this destruction."

In response, Ultear just froze Ur's hands the same way she did Lyon's. She turned to look at her daughter.

"Ultear! Release me right now!" Gray and Lyon were watching on, shocked.

"Mom, just help Gray. Trust me, we'll all walk out of this alive," Ultear pleaded.

"But-"

"Please..." Ultear pleaded once more. Ur was put off-guard by the confidence in her eyes.

She sighed. "Unfreeze my hands. I'll help you. This ice is really strong."

With that, Ultear unfroze the hands of her mother and Lyon ("You help us too," Ur had commanded). They made a large spike of ice that reached as high as Deliora.

"Will this be enough?" Gray asked.

"Plenty," Ultear commented, "now just stand back." After the three did so, Ultear faced the pillar of ice and inhaled hard. The ice turned to magic energy in the force of her inhaling and went down her throat. Ur, Lyon, and Gray watched on, shocked, as the entire pillar of ice disappeared down her throat. Once the last of it had vanished, she relaxed, hunching over unceremoniously. "Thanks," she said, with deep breaths.

"What just happened?" Gray asked, now very curious.

"Did she just... drink the ice?" Lyon asked, amazed.

"You absorbed the ice as magic power?" Ur asked, amazed.

Ultear simply paid them no mind. She prepared the magic in her hands, with one hand emanating the purple frost of her own Ice-Make Magic and the other emanating a bright red frost for her other Ice Magic. She got into an Ice Make stance, putting her fist to her palm.

" **Sacred** **Ice Mode.** " Once she called this out, a black tattoo appeared, which covered her forearms.

" **Ice Make: Crescent Moon.** " As she released her magic, pushing her hand out in front of her towards Deliora, a bright red crescent-shaped blade the size of its leg shot out and cut a deep gash through its arm, causing it to wail out in pain and blood to come gushing out. All spectators simply watched in awe at this display.

" **Ice Make: Giant's Armor.** " As she called this out, she rose into the sky on giant legs, the rest of a giant suit of "armor" forming around it until Ultear was inside the giant's head and the ice-giant was as tall as Deliora. Said demon turned around only to receive a punch to the face, making it stagger back. As it was regaining its balance, Ultear formed a giant ice sword and sliced at the demon's front, delaying its recovery even further. She then stabbed it in the gut, making it jerk its head skyward in agony. Ultear took this opportunity to freeze it in her ice.

" **Ice Devil's... Rage!** " When she finished, her magic roar hit Deliora squarely in the gut (again), causing it more agony and freezing it in place, until all but the head was unfrozen. As the list of what froze included it's neck, it could only look and shoot lasers skyward. Ultear broke her giant and landed on her feet, her mom and mom's pupils running up to her.

"That was incredible! I can't believe you actually managed to freeze it!" Lyon cheered.

"You cheered up awfully quickly, Lyon," Gray commented, turning to Lyon and then back to Ultear, "And what kind of ice _is_ that?"

"I thought I said no tattoos until you were 16!" Ur scolded.

They all sweat-dropped at her response.

"Uh, Ur, I think the bigger question is 'Why didn't she kill it?'" Gray noted.

"Yeah, why is that?" Lyon asked.

"I'm waiting for my friend," Ultear responded simply.

"Oh, a friend?" Ur asked.

"Well, yeah. I made a friend on my way here, and he can help. I asked him to come. We can kill it together," Ultear explained. Technically, she _did_ meet Natsu during her life, and her being in the past happened later, if that makes any sense. She didn't say anything about needing his help, though...

"What? _That_ didn't kill it?" Lyon said incredulously, gesturing to the frozen demon.

Ultear was about to respond when everyone heard a loud roar. They looked up, expecting to see Deliora break out of the ice, but they instead saw a giant, scaly, flying...

"Is that...?" Ur asked with amazement, not being able to move her eyes away.

"It's a dragon!" Gray said with astonishment.

"No way! You know a dragon?!" Lyon asked Ultear with astonishment.

"Only by association," Ultear answered.

"Huh? What do you mean?" Ur asked.

"My friend is that dragon's foster son. He must currently be on top of the dragon. He's probably getting all fired up..." Ultear internally chuckled at her own joke. As the dragon flew over the demon, a little physically-ten-year-old Natsu jumped, his fist ablaze with a large, brilliant white flame. He punched the demon in the face with it on his way down and landed on his feet as it exploded in Deliora's face and it fell backwards, the ice freezing it melting away.

"...literally," Ultear finished. She turned to him, and scolded him as her family watched on, comically astonished at their antics. "You're late, Natsu! I asked you to get over here an hour ago!"

"Don't blame me! Blame Igneel! Igneel's the one who flew too slowly!" he argued.

" ** _You were just lucky I didn't throw you off, my ungrateful son! You were the one who forgot to use the restroom at the den!_** " Said dragon landed with a thud, arguing with Natsu.

"I didn't have to go then!" he countered, to everyone's sweat-dropping.

"Uh, Natsu, I think we have bigger problems than the fact that you have poor judgement skills," Ultear said awkwardly.

"Yeah, you idiot. We need to beat that thing," Gray added.

"Yeah, yeah, just leave it to us... stripper," Natsu shot back. Gray looked down and noticed his clothes were on the ground. Freaking out comically, he picked them up and put them on. Natsu turned to the dragon. "Yo, Igneel, I need you to distract him!"

" _ **Why?**_ " Igneel asked.

"Ultear and I need to combine our Magic to kill that thing! Just do it!" Natsu responded.

" ** _Fine._** " Igneel then took off, flew above the demon, who had gotten up, and hit him with an authentic Fire Dragon's Roar, catching its attention once the explosion nearly twisted its arm. The demon turned his gaze to Igneel, trying to grapple him out of the air. Igneel just kept flying, with his advanced aerial acrobatics keeping him out of harm's way.

Natsu, meanwhile, walked over to Ultear, who met him in the middle. "Hey, Natsu, you mean..." she started.

"Yep. Let's use that," Natsu agreed.

"What are you talking about?" Gray asked.

"You'll see..." Ultear smiled playfully. She turned to face Deliora next to Natsu, who grabbed her hand. She found herself blushing lightly at the contact with his warm hand, which was certainly a change from the cold. She then focused her magic into her hand, which now emanated bright red frost, signature of her Devil Slayer Magic, and also a white glow with floating white embers, signature of _his_ Devil Slayer Magic. They aimed their joined hands at the monster, which was Igneel's cue to land next to them.

" _ **Kid, now!**_ " he commanded.

"Right," Natsu and Ultear answered at the same time. The magic in their hands intensified in appearance, with their hands separating and a ball of the bright red ice emitting the white glow and embers filled the gap (plus, there was a little white flame inside the ball now). Natsu and Ultear both aimed their hands (each of them used one on top of the other) towards Deliora, who was now looking at them, preparing to fire a Magic beam.

" **Unison... Raid!** " Once they called this out, the ball became a beam of ice, which overpowered Deliora's Magic beam and hit it square in the face. The ice froze his head, with a little ice forming a spiky 'comet' look, causing him to stagger backwards. The ice spread to his chest before it exploded in white flames, blowing off the top half of Deliora, leaving only a pair of legs, which then disappeared in a cloud of sparkles.

"We did it!" Ultear cheered, raising her hands and smiling.

"That was awesome, Ultear!" Natsu cheered, smiling at her.

"Yeah, but half of that was your power, you know!" she answered back while smiling.

"You... you defeated it..." Lyon processed, apparently overwhelmed.

"Ultear, how did you do that? And who is your friend here?" Ur asked, apparently amazed.

"...I think it's best we talk at the house. We'll explain everything," Ultear promised.

But Gray and Natsu weren't listening, but they were already fighting, which made Ultear sweat-drop. She sighed. "Not even out of the cold and they're already fighting... I guess fire and ice really don't mix," she mused.

"So he used Fire Magic?" Ur asked.

"Basically, yes, but it's more complicated than that," Ultear answered. She then walked over to Igneel, who had been watching Natsu and Gray fight with slight amusement and now looked down to her.

" ** _Greetings, little girl. My name is Igneel. What is your name?_** " he asked.

"I am Ultear, Ice-Make Wizard. That woman over there is my mother, Ur, the silver-haired kid is Lyon, and the guy arguing with Natsu is Gray," she introduced, gesturing to the people she was referring to as she mentioned them, with Gray being the only one who didn't wave back.

" ** _I see. So, you're the girl Natsu told me about. I already know everything about what happened with you and Natsu, and apparently some other guy named Kai. Nice to meet you. And, as long as we're mentioning titles, mine... is the Fire Dragon King,_** " Igneel said cordially.

"Fire Dragon King?! Wow! I never knew that, Igneel!" Natsu called, stopping his struggling, which caused Gray to punch him back into fighting with him.

"Ultear, what's he talking about?" Ur said, stepping over (not on) the struggling Natsu and Gray on the ground, walking over to her.

"Like I said, I'll explain everything at the house. There are people nearby and I don't really want them to know," Ultear answered. She then turned back to Igneel. "May we have a ride back to our house? It's not very far," she asked.

"Ultear, that's rude," Ur warned.

" ** _No, it's fine. After all, Natsu isn't exactly the most_ polite _son one could have,_** " Igneel commented, pointing his snout to Natsu, who was currently giving Gray a serious noogie. Then Gray punched him in the stomach and continued the fight.

"...I can see that..." Ur commented slowly, not sure how to react in this situation.

"I agree," Ultear said, smiling.

" _ **Anyways, you might want to separate Natsu and that Gray kid first,**_ " Igneel said, lowering his body to the snow. Once they did so, they all climbed on top of Igneel and he took off, flying to Ur's house.

...

Ultear had just finished explaining them travelling back in time, training, and their magic, with Natsu chiming in a couple of times, volunteering usually useless bits of information. Among the questions and comments were:

"So... You're from the future?" -Gray

"Devil Slayer Magic? I've never heard of that before." -Ur

"So, let me get this straight... your foster father is a dragon?" -Lyon

"You were taught by a ghost? Is he here right now?" -Lyon again

"I... died?" -Ur

Anyway, Ultear and Natsu filled them all in on everything. By the time they were done, they were all silent for a minute.

"...I see. You wanted to change the future, huh? Well, what are we waiting around here for?" Ur asked.

"Huh?" Ultear said, confused.

"Well, isn't it obvious? I want to spend more time with my daughter! You didn't get a lot of time to spend with me, did you?" Ur answered/asked back.

"W-Well... that's true... Do you really want to? We'd be leaving home and probably moving around a lot for a few years or so..." Ultear said.

"I don't mind. You said I died using Iced Shell the first time around, but I didn't use it this time, thanks to you and Natsu-kun. Why not spend these years of life you've let me have with my daughter, my adorable pupils, and her friend? Plus, there's a dragon there, too. Not many people get to see that," Ur explained.

"Yeah! It'll be fun!" Lyon commented, smiling.

"'Natsu-kun'? Ur, I think you're overreacting..." Gray said, sweat-dropping, causing her to smack him upside the head.

"Okay, it's settled! We're going on a journey!" Lyon said cheerfully.

"Where to first?" Ur asked.

"...We'll go to the Tower of Heaven next," Ultear said, thinking.

"What's that?" Gray asked.

"It's a giant magic tower in the middle of the sea," Natsu summed up, clenching his fist.

"It's currently being built on slave labor by a cult of worshippers of the black mage Zeref. Most of the slaves are children," Ultear explained. Ur, Lyon, and Gray reacted with disgust, meaning that Ur gasped, Lyon gaped, and Gray growled.

"A-Are you serious?" Lyon asked.

"You might wanna save that question for when you _see_ the tower itself," Ultear added.

"Are we going to save the slaves?" Ur asked.

"Yep. My friend Erza is there," Natsu noted.

"Not to mention the kids that would later become the Oracion Seis," Ultear added, earning a confused look from Ur, Lyon, and Gray.

"Yeah, them too," Natsu said halfheartedly.

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go!" Lyon said excitedly.

"I can't wait," Ur said, smiling.

"Yeah!" Natsu agreed, before his stomach grumbled. He groaned, while Ultear and Ur giggled at him.

"Now I wish I had eaten that bear at home," he groused.

"Maybe we should eat here?" Ur suggested.

"Sounds good," Natsu agreed, still sounding like he received a (MANLY!) punch to the gut.

"You are going to love my cooking," Ur said to him.

"Is it as good as Igneel's?" he groaned.

"Uhhh... I guess? I didn't know he could cook..." Ur said slowly.

"Besides, I bet his food is all burnt anyway," Gray mused, igniting a fight between him and Natsu.

...

 **After dinner...**

Natsu was standing outside now. He patted his belly, complimenting the empty air on Ur's food. Ultear had followed him, agreeing with him on Ultear's food.

"So, Natsu... we changed the past, huh?" Ultear smiled proudly.

"Huh? Well, I guess so..." Natsu said, putting his hand to his chin.

"You enjoy my mom's cooking, don't you?" Ultear asked.

"Yeah, I do. Why?" Natsu asked.

"Well, she's alive thanks to us, so there's that," Ultear answered.

"Yep. It must be great to have her back after all these years, huh?" Natsu asked.

"Huh? Of course, silly! You feel the same thing, right? You know, Igneel suddenly disappeared on you before? Do you want to try to convince him to stay?" Ultear asked.

"You're right. I've just been thinking... I think Igneel disappeared on me for his own reasons, and I think he still has those reasons. I'm sure I'll find him again," Natsu confessed.

Ultear's face looked thoughtful for a minute, then she smiled at him. "Good for you, Natsu-kun," she said.

"Thanks. Hey, you called me 'Natsu-kun'," he noted.

"W-What? No!" she said, blushing profusely (her face looked like a Christmas ornament, but it doesn't go on a tree).

"Really? I'm sure I heard you say that... oh, well," Natsu shrugged. Then, his ears twitched as he picked up something on his ears.

"Footsteps..."

"Huh?" Ultear asked.

"I figured you'd hear me, even as a little kid, Natsu."

Natsu's eyes widened as he turned to the source of the voice. "You're..."

"Hey," the stranger responded.

Natsu's mouth contorted into a smile. "Loke! Long time no see, man! How's it been?"

"Kinda hectic, really. I mean, first we had the whole Eclipse business, then we had this time travelling stuff going on, and it just gets very crazy trying to deal with it all," responded Loke a.k.a. Leo the Lion, leader of the Zodiac Twelve. He was wearing his formal wear: suit and tie, dress shoes, glasses, hair that looked like there were lion ears sticking out of it, rings.

Ultear chuckled nervously, apparently having only met Loke for the first time. "You know about that?" she asked nervously.

Loke chuckled. "Don't worry, miss. We're not mad or anything. In fact, it actually kind of saved us. I sensed something bad coming before Eclipse was opened, a presence of some kind, and it went away once we were brought back in time. Pisces, Libra, and Ophiuchus were the only ones who didn't remember their former Mage, Yukino Agria. We figured out that, since we were all in the Celestial Spirit World, our memories with Lucy remained intact, along with everything she did for us and with us, when you two were brought back in time, even though those three only remembered that they wanted to be contracted to Lucy. However, the Lucy who made contracts with all of us is still alive somewhere, I can feel it. Evidently, the Celestial Spirit King brought us to this time. He wants all of us to become contracted to the Lucy from here," he explained.

"No way! Really?" Ultear asked in surprise.

"Yes. By the way, what's your name?" he asked.

"Ultear Milkovich," she answered.

"Ah, you're the one who unlocked Lucy's Second Origin, weren't you?" Loke asked.

"Yep, that was me," Ultear confirmed.

"She told me about that. You must be very talented," Loke complimented.

Ultear smiled. "Thanks," she said. Her look then did a complete 180. "By the way, I'm not going to fall for you when I'm older, so don't even think about it."

"Can't blame a guy for trying," Loke shrugged, his expression turning serious afterwards, "but I came here to discuss business."

"Business? What business could a Celestial Spirit have with us?" Ultear asked.

"Our contracts are with Lucy. However, we currently don't know where _our_ Lucy is, and the Lucy of this time doesn't have the magic power to become contracted to us all at once, and you two are the only ones we can currently turn to, seeing as you knew the Lucy we were contracted to personally. Natsu was her guildmate and Ultear helped her out for the Grand Magic Games. Even if Ultear doesn't know her so well, we can only trust her as one of Natsu's friends. Currently, Aquarius is contracted with Lucy, and the rest of her spirits are also to be assigned to her later. However, our keys can still fall into the wrong hands now, so we knew we had to make contracts with _someone_. And who better to turn to than the ones we can trust?" he explained.

"So... you want to all make contracts with Natsu?" Ultear asked.

"Technically, we can make contracts with anyone, so long as it doesn't go against any of our current contracts or any of our mages' wishes. You two happened to be Lucy's friends, and also mature enough to not fall into the darkness like Zoldeo."

"Who?" Natsu asked.

"Oh, right. Well, Zoldeo was Capricorn's former Mage, who broke one of the laws of Celestial Spirit Magic, fusing his body with Capricorn's. I freed him from Zoldeo's control on Tenrou Island, so he was dead in the other timeline and Capricorn is assigned to Layla Heartfilia." He started pacing back and forth.

"Wasn't that Lucy's mom?" Natsu asked offhandedly.

"Yes," Loke responded. "However, if we wait too long, events will happen as they did before. I will disobey my current Mage Karen Lilica, who gets killed by Angel of the Oracion Seis, and I will almost die, along with Aries, Gemini, and Scorpio suffering under a cruel Mage. Libra and Pisces will be contracted to Yukino Agria, which isn't a bad thing, but they expressed a wish to be contracted to someone like Lucy. Capricorn will have to undergo that torture Zoldeo will put him through. And the rest of Lucy's spirits will have to wait to become contracted to Lucy." Loke turned to the two of them. "I have discussed this with everyone in the Celestial Spirit World, and even Ophiuchus wants to become contracted to Lucy in this timeline since someone created the opening. However, we have to wait until Lucy's older before we can all be contracted to her, or else she may become greedy."

"No she won't! Lucy loves her spirits!" Natsu interrupted.

"We are talking about a time period when Lucy is growing up. If she suddenly gains a lot of Celestial Spirits, she may become greedy for more Celestial Gate Keys or cocky that she is contracted to the 12 Zodiac Spirits. We don't want to take that chance, however small we know it may be, so we wanted to contract with Natsu, and Ultear, if she agrees. What do you say, you two?" he explained/asked.

Natsu didn't even think about it.

"Deal."

"Wha-? Natsu-kun, aren't you going to think about this?" Ultear stammered.

"No. Loke and the other Celestial Spirits are my friends. If they need help, I'm going to help them, no matter what," Natsu explained seriously.

"Hey, you called him 'Natsu-kun'! You like him, don't you?" Loke joked, smiling.

"H-Hey, that's not true! And besides, that's not the point here!" Ultear said defensively, as bright red as a tomato.

"Come on, Ultear. Won't you help a friend?" Natsu looked at her, a look of inquiry in his eyes, something that was so rare, finding all the dragons, Zeref, and Acnologia in one place at one time and expecting them not to fight each other would have been more believable. She sighed.

"Okay. I'll help too. So, how will this work exactly?" she asked.

Loke reached into his pocket and pulled out a golden key ring with the 13 Gold Celestial Gate Keys and 8 Silver Celestial Gate Keys.

"Are those... Celestial Spirit keys?" Natsu asked.

...

 **An hour later...**

Natsu and Ultear walked towards Ur's house together. Natsu was looking at the back of his right hand, where there was a tattoo of the symbol of Leo the Lion. In addition, he had also formed contracts with Virgo, Aquarius (they didn't get along at first, but she smiled when Natsu gave her a fiery response to her rudeness), Aries, Libra, even Ophiuchus (who had appeared in the form of a nurse, she explained why), as well as Lyra, Polaris, Deneb the Swan, and Caelum. His arms were now tattooed with the symbols for Gemini and Pisces (one on each of his forearms), his back was tattooed with the symbols of Deneb, Polaris, and Caelum (in a downwards triangle), his hands had the tattoos for Lyra and Leo/Loke, and his six-pack was adorned with the tattoos of Aquarius, Libra, Aries, Ophiuchus, and Virgo (Ophiuchus in the center, with Aquarius and Virgo a little above and close together, while Aries and Libra were below and just as close together).

Ultear had made contracts with Scorpio, Capricorn, Taurus (she didn't like him), Sagittarius, Cancer, Holorogium, Gemini, Pisces, Pyxis, Crux, and little Plue. You may have noticed the repeats, but they were there because Gemini and Pisces compromised within themselves (Gemi wanted to contract with Ultear while Mini had wanted to contract with Natsu, and Mother Pisces wanted to contract with Natsu while her son wanted to contract with Ultear). Now, her stomach was home to tattoos of Scorpio, Capricorn, Cancer, Sagittarius, and Taurus (same pattern as with Natsu's five stomach tattoos, but Taurus was in the center, Scorpio and Cancer were above and Capricorn and Sagittarius were below), her hands had the tattoos of Gemini and Pisces, and her tattoos for Holorogium, Pyxis, Crux, and Plue (Canis Minor) were on her arms (Pyxis and Plue were each on one forearm while Holorogium and Crux placed their tattoos on her biceps).

Long story short, it took an hour just to sort this all out, make the contracts, and explain that they could not summon the keys from this time, so they had to make do with sub-contracts, which didn't require a key necessarily.

"Well, that was kind of hard to follow," Natsu commented.

Ultear giggled lightly. "Don't worry. You'll get the hang of it. We both will."

With that, they looked at each other and smiled. They now entered the house (Igneel was still there) and slept in their futons, which were in the same room ('Are you trying to set me up with Natsu, Mom?' she had said, to which she received no reply.)

::::::::::::::::

Yo! I totally did this last part late at night. It took me a little work, but I did it. Anyway, tell me how you like it. Also, I'm going to get a poll up later asking whether or not I should go into M-rated territory! On one hand, I've never done that kind of thing before, but I can try. On the other hand, I know what the pairing would be... Natsu x ... (you'll have to vote to find out. I'll say it no matter which way it goes). Bye!


	4. Ch 3: Training and Liberation

Yo! Quick note: I'm using the anime appearance for the Tower of Heaven, which is very different from the manga's version.

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.

::::::::::::::::::

"Where did you get those tattoos?"

Ur wasn't usually a morning person, but she didn't think her list of waking-up problems would include hallucinating, and she was seeing her daughter and her friend with new tattoos on their arms and hands.

"Oh, it's a long story," Ultear exaggerated, taking a bite from her eggs.

Ur sat down at the table, where Ultear and Natsu were finishing up breakfast. Gray and Lyon didn't say anything before they went outside to train after eating (probably thinking something like 'It's not like there's anything wrong...') Ur had just put her dishes by the washbasin (they live in a cabin in the mountains; it's not like they get the luxury of regular plumbing) and sat back down, since she wanted to ask about the new tattoos.

"I have time," she answered, leaning forward and taking a drink.

"Okay." Ultear put her fork down, her voice still level. "Last night, we were visited by a Celestial Spirit."

This made Ur spit out her water to the side. She wiped her mouth with her sleeve. "What? Is that some sort of joke? It doesn't sound like one. Does that sound like a reason to be home late? I had to make Lyon and Gray go to bed earlier because I was worried for you and I was looking for you all over! Tell me what happened," she commanded, concerned.

"Well, don't worry, Natsu was a good friend to the Celestial Spirits in our time, so he wouldn't have hurt us anyway. He was Leo the Lion, the leader of the 12 Zodiac Spirits. He was on business with Natsu and me," Ultear explained.

Ur seemed lost in thought for a moment. "So, what did he want?" she asked. 'I guess I'll play along,' was her mind's general consensus.

"He wanted to make contracts with us so that their keys wouldn't fall into evil hands..."

 _Flashback, the previous night..._

 _"Are those... Celestial Spirit keys?"_

 _"I thought you couldn't summon your keys?" Ultear asked._

 _"When I said 'Our keys can still fall into the wrong hands now', I meant that, if you said no, these keys would have been found in the same manner as from your time, and history would repeat itself. I can already summon my own key, but, as the leader of the most powerful spirits in the Celestial Spirit World, I can summon any keys, including those of my fellow Zodiac Spirits, and it works faster if the spirit gives me their permission, which all of them have," Loke explained._

 _"Including the Celestial Spirit King?" Ultear asked, curious._

 _"His Majesty doesn't have a key. Also, he is my boss and my king; I don't think I would be able to summon his key if he had one," Loke added._

 _"Let's get on with this!" Natsu said, clearly fired up as he punched his palm._

 _"Okay. First, we should probably ask them which spirits choose Natsu and which choose Ultear. I will summon them all, and I will teach you how to summon them after we get this all sorted out," Loke asked, holding up the key for Aquarius. It glowed white rather than the gold glow it was when Lucy used the key, and a golden glow appeared in front of him, dissipating to reveal a mermaid with blue hair, a unique headpiece that decorated her forehead with a jewel, and a Zodiac symbol adorning her collarbone and the jar she was holding, the symbol of the Water Bearer. She was levitating and didn't look happy._

 _"Hey, Aquarius. You look as beautiful as ever," Loke complimented, smirking._

 _Aquarius 'tch'ed. "Yeah, yeah, lover boy. Let's just get this over with," she said grumpily, turning to them. She immediately pointed to Natsu. Then, she moved forward and placed her hand right under his chest, and a glow appeared and then vanished. A tattoo had appeared. It was the symbol for Aquarius, a squiggly line. The key in Loke's hand separated into many little golden magic particles and flowed into the tattoo, which glowed blue._

 _"There, happy?" she asked angrily._

 _"Would you cut that out?" Natsu snapped._

 _"What do you mean?" Aquarius asked, keeping her tone._

 _"Talking like you're so irritated. What're you so mad about anyway?" Natsu asked casually._

 _"Why you...!" She lunged at him, to hit him with her urn. He simply put his hand up to stop it. She forcefully pulled it back, meeting no resistance._

 _"Did something happen?" Natsu asked._

 _"Shut up! What do you care?" Aquarius shot back._

 _"Well, you are Lucy's spirit, and that makes you my friend! It's not like I_ wouldn't _care!" Natsu shot back, raising his voice._

 _Aquarius paused for a moment, staring at him. 'His eyes... I think he actually cares... just like that brat...' she noted mentally. Then, suddenly, she grinned._

 _"Hm?" Natsu grunted, cocking his eyebrow at her sudden reaction._

 _"Just don't die, kid," she advised. She turned away from him, turning her head to look at him over her shoulder, telling him when he could summon her, before leaving, vanishing in a blur of golden sparkles._

 _"What was her problem?" Ultear asked, Natsu rubbing his new tattoo, seeing as he was practically pushed by her hand._

 _"Don't worry about her. She's always moody like that," Loke explained, causing her to sweat-drop as Natsu lifted his shirt to see a bruise around a clearly distinguishable blue tattoo (which was no longer glowing)._

 _"That's not exactly comforting..." she deadpanned._

 _"Anyway, next up, Aries," Loke said, ignoring her._

 _"Wait, did the key go into that tattoo?" Ultear asked._

 _"No. Only the ability to summon Aquarius just like a Celestial Spirit Mage would with the key. I'll talk more about it when we start training," Loke responded._

 _They repeated the process for the rest of the spirits, with the keys for Sagittarius, Taurus, Scorpio, Cancer, Aries, Virgo, Libra, Ophiuchus (yes, even_ she _wanted a new Mage), Gemini, Pisces, Holorogium, Pyxis, Crux, Lyra, Polaris, Caelum, Plue, and Deneb the Swan appearing on Natsu and Ultear, whomever they chose. Within Gemini and Pisces, the two opposite-gendered entities each wanted to choose different owners, so they simply decided that they would each put a tattoo on the person they picked. The tattoos themselves depicted half of the symbol of Gemini/Pisces._

 _"What's with these tattoos from Gemini and Pisces? Why are they each only a half?" Ultear asked._

 _"I've been wondering about that too..." Natsu added._

 _"Ultear, do you see how they fit together if you put your hand with the mark of Pisces on his arm with the mark of Pisces? They each wanted to contract to separate people, but they didn't want to be divided over this, so they simply compromised. If you want to summon Gemini or Pisces in battle, Ultear, you have to put your tattoo over his, and both of the Twins or Fish will appear. It's a little hard, so I'll show you how to do it in the near future."_

 _"Hey, Loke, how do you know how to summon spirits?" Natsu asked._

 _"You're kidding, right?" Loke asked jokingly. "We're Celestial Spirits. We're the ones who taught humans how to summon us. Only we could make keys that could summon us completely. Anyone else would mess something up or summon spirits incorrectly. That wouldn't be right."_

 _"Hey, Leo-"_

 _"You can call me Loke, Ultear," he reminded her._

 _"Right. Loke, what about you? Are you going to make a contract with one of us?" Ultear asked._

 _"Yeah. Sorry to disappoint you, though, but it's Natsu I want to make a contract with," Loke confessed._

 _"Huh? Me?" Natsu asked, clearly confused._

 _"You're one of my closest friends, next to Lucy. I don't mean to be rude, but I remember thinking that one time when I had returned back to the Celestial Spirit World that, if I was given a choice, I would rather be contracted to you if I had to pick someone else. Given that Lucy is currently missing, I want to make a contract with you," Loke explained._

 _"Ah. Okay then," Natsu replied._

 _Back to the present..._

"Really?" Ur asked with mock interest. "Can I ask this Leo a few questions?" she asked.

"Okay, mom, if it will get you to believe what I'm saying. Natsu, summon Loke," she replied.

"No need."

Ur jumped, turning to find the source of the voice, a man she didn't know. He was wearing a formal suit and tie, glasses, a couple rings, and spiky hair.

"Besides, I haven't taught you guys how to summon us yet. It would be kind of hard to just try it without anyone teaching you," he added.

Ur stood up and blocked the path to her daughter and guest. "Who are you? Why did you break in?" she asked assertively.

"Whoa, whoa, beautiful, please calm down. I didn't break in at all. I summoned myself since Natsu can't summon Celestial Spirits yet." He cleared his throat. "Allow me to introduce myself to you. I am Leo the Lion, but my human friends call me Loke."

"Wait, Ultear was telling the truth?" Ur asked, earning a comical glare from her daughter.

"Mom! Of course I was telling the truth! Why would you think I was lying?" she yelled (comically).

"Well..." Ur turned as red as a tomato after she said that, imagining Natsu kissing Ultear, among other things.

"Oh, come on! We're just good friends!" Ultear countered, blushing as well.

"Anyway, what questions did you have for me?" Loke asked.

"Why are you here? I mean, I'm not against it anymore, but I was just wondering," Ur asked.

"Oh, I came to see if Natsu and Ultear were ready for training," Loke responded.

"'Training'?" Ur asked.

"They aren't Celestial Spirit Mages yet. They still need to learn how to summon us, so we need some time to train and practice so they can add it to their growing list of abilities," Loke explained.

"Ah. We should wait a little, then. I guess I should teach Gray and Lyon some new things too in the meantime," Ur commented.

"Awesome!" That voice came from behind the door.

"Lyon, get in here. Is Gray there too?" Ur asked, clearly annoyed.

"I'm here," he responded. They walked into the room, closing the door behind them. They fixed their eyes on Loke, who looked back down at them.

"So this guy is a Celestial Spirit?" Gray asked.

"What are those?" Lyon asked.

"Celestial Spirits are beings from the Celestial Spirit world derived from constellations. We now help humans. I suppose you heard my introduction, so I'll just say one thing: You can call me Loke," he explained.

"Okay! Nice to meet you!" Lyon said cheerfully.

"Well, Natsu, Ultear, and I should get going. We have to hurry if we want to make it to the Tower of Heaven in time."

...

 **It took Natsu and Ultear a month to be able to summon spirits for a practical length of time (Loke had summoned himself on his own power) and even longer to be able to summon a Zodiac Celestial Spirit. It was 2 years later when Natsu could summon four Zodiac Spirits at once and Ultear was getting close to four. Igneel had stayed the whole time, in the new cave Natsu made by punching a nearby cliff repeatedly with his Dragon Slayer Magic. Ur, meanwhile, had given Lyon and Gray swords and taught them swordsmanship so they could learn her new Ice Magic Technique, Freeze Blade Style, which combined Ice Magic with Sword Magic. Naturally, they were excited. In fact, Gray managed to master wielding 'Shunkan Tooketsu' (alternatively 'Flash Freeze'), a Magic Ice Blade that morphed into a Magic Ice Bow, in battle, switching forms properly and fast, and Lyon learned to wield two katanas, 'Fubuki no Maebure' and 'Meidoo Hyoo' (or 'Snowstorm Bringer' and 'Rumbling Hail', respectively) at once, utilizing the abilities their weapons granted them in combat. They had yet to test their abilities in a real battle, but they performed pretty well in training. Meanwhile, there were others working hard, too...**

...

 **X775, the public library of Magnolia...**

Levy was sitting quietly, reading a novel and totally enjoying it. Suddenly, she got a tap on the back of the neck. Looking up to see who it was, she saw a red-haired man sitting next to her. She put down her book, marking her place with a cute little self-decorated bookmark she had brought, and asked, "May I help you?"

"I just noticed you were reading one of my favorite books. Do you like to read?" he asked.

"Yes, I like to read very much," she answered.

"Have you gotten to the end already?" he asked.

"No, I haven't... Please, don't spoil the ending for me..." she answered.

He chuckled amiably. "I wasn't going to. I just thought you might enjoy this book about Magic," he said, handing her a book with gold-lined pages and an old leather cover and binding.

Levy took the book, examining it with fascination. "Wow, this is really old? Where'd you get it?" she asked, keeping her attention on the book.

"I just had it lying around. I don't need it, and I just decided to give it away today. Except, that book is very valuable. Lots of people want a lot of money for it, and it was in my possession because I didn't want the wrong people to get their hands on it. I think... you're a very friendly person, just from learning how you like to read," he explained.

"Really? It's valuable? Why?" Levy asked innocently, now looking at him.

"It has a hidden message that contains the secret to a very powerful Magic. Are you a Mage?" he explained.

"Yeah, I am. I use Solid Script Magic, but I'm not very good yet..." Levy answered.

"Mm. Well, allow me to let you in on a secret..." he said, gesturing for her to lean towards him. She did so, putting her ear next to his mouth, and whispered, "I know the name of this Magic. It is called 'Trait Script'."

"'Trait Script'? Is it like Solid Script?" Levy asked.

"Well, I think so," he answered.

"You think I can solve the puzzle?" Levy asked innocently.

"Yep," he said bluntly.

"Wait, I forgot to ask your name," she remembered.

"It's Kai," he stated. He then added, "By the way, I think this would make a nice bookmark." He gave her a card (if you could see it, readers, you could see that it was a Dream Card, but she doesn't know that), which she took. He then said, "I have to go, but, whatever you do, no matter what, never give the book or that card away, okay?"

Levy smiled at this stranger. "Okay. You can count on me!" she said.

He smiled at her. "I know," he answered. With that, he walked away.

...

 **In the middle of the ocean, X776...**

"Hya!" Erza grunted. She was currently training with Kai, who came back every night to train her, as a ghost just outside her cell while she could, before the guards came back to wake her up. She had been training all night, trading blows and clashing (real) swords with him, and she could now withstand him attacking her gut with a hard punch more than once without getting knocked back. She had gotten used to it, since he meant her no ill will. They had devised the plan to train just outside their cell so that they could notice the guards before the guards noticed them. It had been working well for the past few years. They stopped to catch their breath, panting.

"You're getting really strong, Erza," Kai commented.

"Thanks. I'm just glad we can train like this so that nobody can see us. It's very convenient," she replied, panting like Kai.

"Is magic getting any easier for you?" Kai asked.

"Sort of. I can feel my magic being slowly drained as a ghost, but I don't know how to draw upon it myself yet," she answered.

"I see. Well, it helps if you know how it works. I'm sure you can figure out how the spell is drawing upon your magic and where it's drawing from. After that, it shouldn't be that hard," Kai hinted.

"Thanks for the hint," Erza replied.

"I am your teacher. No need to thank me for teaching you," Kai joked, chuckling.

"You know, Kai-sensei, I always wondered... why did you pick _me_ of all people to train? A girl imprisoned in a tower with other kids and forced to build the tower up? Jellal I can understand, but why me?" Erza asked, sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall (remember, she's had a few years to master the spell she received).

I should just go ahead and explain bluntly now in first person what she's talking about. Once she had gotten the tattoo, she chose Jellal as to bring with her in her ghost form. I think I'll just...

 _Flashback, the middle of the ocean, X772_

 _It was the night after Kai's first visit. Jellal and everyone had gathered at lunch and noticed Erza was hiding something, but, after she would deny their help politely, they just let her be, even though they were concerned. Now it was that night, and Kai had come again, much to her surprise._

 _"Kai? What are you doing here?" she asked._

 _"I told you we'd meet again, Erza," he said, smiling._

 _"But you were talking like you'd never come back," Erza countered._

 _"Well, that wasn't true. I was just surveying the tower and it's inhabitants, including your friends. Why don't you introduce me to one of them? That blue-haired kid with a tattoo on his face, perhaps?" he explained._

 _"Jellal? Why him?" Erza asked innocently._

 _"He seems interesting. At least I know he's nice," Kai answered._

 _"Okay, but how are we going to meet him? I can't get out of this cell and he can't see you anyway," Erza asked, standing up._

 _"You could always use that spell I gave you. And I can get his attention. Just leave it to me."_

 _End of the Flashback_

Long story short, after Kai got his attention, he introduced himself and started training the two of them physically. He had given Jellal the same Arc of Spirits spell as Erza and they trained in the hallway. At least Erza's and Jellal's cells were close to each other (somewhat)...

"Well, Erza, you're very special even in those cases. I don't mean to make light of your suffering, but you _do_ get physically stronger doing the labor, and, if they punish you regularly, being able to withstand it will help with your physical endurance. Not to mention, these Magic-suppressing cuffs are poorly-made. If you can counter their anti-Magic effect, even a little, you must have a lot of Magic power, too much for the cuffs to completely suppress," Kai explained, sitting next to her.

"True, but there are a lot of other kids in this tower. Some of them could have all those things too. So why us?" she countered.

"Because, out of all of them, you have the highest amount of latent Magic power and talent. Once it starts manifesting, you could be a very strong Mage. Besides, I think you can make a great Mage when you and everyone else get out into the real world," Kai answered back.

"You still think that can happen?" Erza asked, downtrodden now.

Kai seemed lost in thought for a moment. "I think... you never know," he answered cryptically.

They just sat like that for a while. Then a guard walked around the corner and Erza ran back inside her cell to wake up her body, while Kai ran with her so he could fly away. They said goodbye and parted ways as Erza fell back into her body (because she was standing up and her body was lying down). The ghost was flying away from the Tower of Heaven as Erza watched him. She looked towards him through the bars, back in her body sufficiently fast enough.

Meanwhile, Kai was flying through the sky, thinking, 'Any day now... I can remove this disguise.'

...

The next day, there was a second Kai sitting in his room in Magnolia, which he had rented by blowing the landlady down with Wind Magic, reminiscing about the night after Loke had talked to Natsu and Ultear, which was the next time they were able to enter the Dream Card.

 _The previous night..._

 _Kai looked outside, noticing it was nighttime, then at his clock, noting that it was five minutes to ten. Grunting, he got up and walked over to his bed, not even bothering with the covers and picking up his Dream Card. He activated it and fell into the dream on his bed._

 _Opening his dream-eyes, he 'awoke' in the forest of his Dream Card. Not long after, Natsu, Ultear, Cana, and Lucy gathered before him. They greeted each other as they got there. Cana was now nine and Lucy eight. Even though they perceived that they were the only real people, they still got to know these 'illusions' well. As well as Cana and Lucy knowing that Natsu uses Dragon Slayer Magic mainly and has learned Devil Slayer Magic, that Ultear specialized in the Arc of Time (and that she kept that a secret) and Ice-Make Magic, and that Kai was a very sage person for his age._

 _"Hey, Natsu, Ultear-nee-chan, where were you last night?" Cana asked._

 _"We were making contracts with Celestial Spirits," Natsu said bluntly. Both Cana and Lucy blinked twice._

 _"W-What?" Lucy stammered._

 _"Well, looks like he spoiled the surprise. Did you notice our new tattoos?" Ultear replied, calmly smiling._

 _"Hm? Oh, I was going to ask about those next," Cana replied._

 _"Do they look familiar, Lucy?" Ultear asked knowingly, also opening Natsu's vest, causing an instinctual blush to appear on the three girls' faces (he was well-defined, after all). Aside from that, Lucy noticed a familiar-looking tattoo._

 _"That's... the symbol for Aquarius!" she recognized._

 _"Hey, that's Aries!" Cana noted, causing the others to look at her. "What? That's my sign!" she protested defensively._

 _"Yes, these tattoos were given to us by the Celestial Spirits. We started learning how to summon them today," Ultear commented._

 _"Does that mean Aquarius visited you?" Lucy asked._

 _"Yes. She kinda fought with Natsu a little, but then she just smiled and left. I don't know what_ that _was all about," Ultear commented._

 _"What do you mean? She's always a grumpy-grump," Lucy said innocently, causing the other two ladies to sweat-drop._

 _"Yeah, that's what Loke said..." Ultear said awkwardly._

 _"Who?" Cana asked._

 _"Leo the Lion. He asked us to call him Loke. He's the leader of the Zodiac Spirits," Ultear explained._

 _"The leader?! Cool!" Lucy commented, her face lighting up._

 _"Yep. And it's nice that Celestial Spirits can make multiple contracts at once with different Mages. I bet Natsu wouldn't want to take your only Celestial Spirit away from you," Ultear commented._

 _"Really? They can do that?" Cana asked, amazed._

 _"I guess so," Natsu commented, surprising the ladies a little with his sudden comment._

 _The girls, however, didn't really move their eyes from his torso. They really had no idea they were staring, aside from one. Ultear mentally chuckled a little. 'It seems I'm going through puberty early somehow,' she mused. She then eyed the other girls, who were doing the same thing she realized she was doing, only she remembered that they weren't living a second time like her. 'Maybe them too...' she noted._

 _Back to the present..._

Kai smiled. 'Oh, they are _so_ going to be ready to rescue Erza's group and the Oracion Seis kids,' he mused.

...

 **X776, Ur's house...**

" _ **You**_ _ **haven't been out here for a while. You kids kept me waiting,**_ " Igneel commented.

"Sorry, Igneel. We kinda had something important to handle first," Natsu apologized.

" _ **It's fine. Let's go, though. That tower isn't going to destroy itself,**_ " Igneel commented, lowering his body to the snow.

"I, for one, am glad we spent so much time training here. My swords are awesome!" Lyon said, smiling. His spiky silver hair stuck up like usual, but, now, he had armor over his torso, as well as gauntlets and greaves. He had his blue jacket on with his long pants under his greaves, as well as his two katanas sheathed in an X on his back. One sheath was decorated with crystals and the other had gray wool near the entrance and had bits of the same crystal under it, like a snow-cloud.

"I guess it's a good thing we learned something new," Gray commented. He had apparently mellowed out a lot while training, seeing as how he had been avenged by his now-fierce rival. He thought he had brought his white jacket, his clothes, and his pants, but he only had on his boxers and the band around his body that held his sheath to his naked torso, also a katana.

"What happened this time? You're naked again, dude," Lyon commented, causing Gray to freak out upon looking down.

"How does that keep happening? Gray, go get your clothes!" Ur commanded (comically). She was, like most of her fellow riders, wearing her jacket as well as her clothes. She had a katana on her. She knew she had successfully made a new Ice-based Magic when her pupils picked it up and used it, so she had trained and practiced alongside them in the Freeze-Blade Style with her own Magic Katana, 'Fuyu no Shikeishikkō' (Winter's Executioner). The sheath was strapped to her belt. Gray, meanwhile, obeyed her, jumping off the dragon's back and running into the cabin.

"He really has a problem now, doesn't he?" Ultear asked rhetorically. She hadn't changed her attire much at all, seeing as how she had the same outfit in her closet (times seven) for every day. She always was too laid back to fuss much over fashion (remember, she was a science experiment as a child and crazy for most of her life, basically). She did get a new jacket, to replace the one she had been two years too old to wear when she had gotten back. Her tattoos shimmered in the daylight like Natsu's.

Speaking of Natsu, he was busy looking down at Igneel, lost in thought. He didn't even notice the cold, seeing as how he was the only one of them who didn't wear a jacket. He claimed his scarf was enough when Ur asked him about it (and then when she forced a jacket onto him). He was still wearing his usual vest and baggy pants, lacking a shirt. None of the ladies complained, though. After all, a nice sight was a nice sight, and, in the case of Ultear and Ur (and Cana and Lucy in the Dream Card), they appreciated that their friend was eye candy among the rest of his good qualities.

The rest of the next hour went by relatively fast. Since Natsu still had Erza's scent in his nose, he pointed the way for Igneel to fly while everyone else watched on, kind of amazed that his nose was that good. Of course, along the way, he explained that his nose was only good because of his Dragon Slayer Magic.

Eventually, that hour was gone and there was a stump of a tower visible in the distance. It was very jagged, looking (quite literally) like a big pile of junk. This confused everyone present but Ultear.

"What is that?" Lyon asked, pointing to the 'stump of a tower'.

"That's the Tower of Heaven," Ultear stated stoically, surprising everyone.

"But it's so small! It's not even a tower!" Ur commented in surprise.

"It would've been finished in X781, but we're going to trash it after rescuing the slaves," Ultear explained.

"Alright! I'm all fired up now!" Natsu shouted, punching his fist.

" _ **By the way, kids, I can't just drop you off. You have to jump as I fly by,**_ " Igneel warned.

"What?! You're crazy!" most of them shouted, startled.

" _ **I'm going to fly low, so don't worry about dying from a fall,**_ " Igneel added. The tower was getting closer and Igneel flew lower, closer to the ocean.

 _Meanwhile, inside the tower..._

Erza was furious. Grandpa Rob saved her with his Magic when he stepped in front of her, but now he was dead since he was shot before he could use his magic. Of course, there's also the fact that she couldn't save him with what she had and the fact that she only discovered how to tap into her Magic reserves _after_ he died, but she didn't care. She was making swords, shields, and other arms fly because she was angry. Everyone watched her with awe, cultist and slave. The Magic-restricting cuffs broke and the swords flew at the cultists forcing them to either dodge or block with what they had. A lot of them retreated in fear. Sadly, there was the army of flying undead soldiers still around, and all of them were part of the Magic-wielding troupe, not to mention the few very brave/stupid/devout (you pick) human cultists who couldn't use Magic. Erza was hunched over and the Magic Squad wasn't moving at all. The slaves were all yelling at Erza to get back, but the Magic wielders shot at her before she could move. Luckily, she had enough endurance to withstand the strain she had just taken and dodge them, still holding her weapons. The shots hit the wall behind the slaves, blowing the wall away. When the shots hit the wall, the slaves, backed away from the wall. Dust spread across the side with the slaves, veiling them all in a cloud. Once the dust settled, the slaves were staring out the giant space where the wall used to be. Many of them gasped or widened their eyes.

"Is that..." one of the children asked.

"Is that an angel?" one of the children asked innocently.

"No, something else," someone next to her told her.

"I can't believe it! It's a dragon!" one of the older slaves shouted.

This set everyone into a panic. Many of them cleared away from the space, the flying Magic troupe moving to intercept the dragon (they were mindless zombies, after all). They fired at the dragon, but it simply opened its mouth and sucked in all the projectiles. It flew over the tower and circled overhead. However, five figures were falling from where the dragon was when it had flown directly overhead. The slaves ran away from where they thought the figures would hit the ground.

" **Ice Make: Slide!** " From the hands of Ur, Ultear, Lyon, and Gray, a spiral slide shot out and formed, reaching the ground. Natsu, meanwhile, had simply turned over in midair and formed a crater when he landed on his feet. The four Ice Mages landed on the ground next to him, the slides disappearing.

"Everyone, get behind us!" Ultear commanded. Ur and Lyon stayed behind to block any shots that would've hit the slaves. Natsu, Ultear, and Gray ran forward. Gray unsheathed his sword and jumped up, slicing up the undead left and right, freezing the ones he sliced open before they broke. Occasionally, one of them tried to shoot him, but he simply called out " **Morph!** " and the tip of the sword shot out a blue string of Magic energy towards the bottom of the hilt, where it fastened onto the pommel, becoming taut, before pulling back on the string and shooting an arrow he formed out of ice. He never got hit with a ranged attack, even when he was morphing his bow back into a sword.

" **Open, Gate of the Archer! Sagittarius!** " Ultear called out, summoning the horse-costumed man with a bow and quiver. " **Open, Gate of the Scorpion! Scorpio!** " This summoned a guy with red/white hair and attire, as well as a giant stinger. "Sagittarius, Scorpio, help me blast them out of the sky!" she commanded.

"Okay, as it were-moshimoshi!" Sagittarius replied, nocking an arrow and aiming it at the army.

"We are! You got it, Lady Ultear!" Scorpio answered, bending over and aiming his stinger at the Magic soldiers.

She herself assumed an Ice Make stance. " **Ice Make: Arrows!** " When she called this out, she thrust her hands forward, a stream of ice arrows shooting out.

" **Star Shot!** " Sagittarius shot an arrow and it multiplied too many times to count, each hitting an undead zombie soldier.

" **Sand Buster!** " Scorpio shot out a blast of sand, pushing back and through the flying Magic troops.

Natsu, meanwhile, was jumping all over the place just like Gray, using his Dragon and Devil Slayer Magics at once in his new mode, **Demonic Fire Dragon Mode** , and beating them up with bare hands, punching them so hard they crashed into the walls. He had two jagged horns sticking out of his head and scales forming around them, visible on his forehead.

Lyon and Ur had formed a giant wall made of ice which blocked all the magic shots with ease. He turned his head and said to the slaves, "Don't worry! We're here to rescue you!" he said to them.

"This will be over soon, don't worry!" Ur called out.

"Umm, excuse me, but could you help save my friend?" Ur lowered her gaze to a red-haired girl with an eyepatch.

"Yes, but after those three deal with those cultists. Neither I nor my pupil can keep up this wall against a barrage-"

"We're done!" Natsu called out. Ur snapped her head forward to see that there was no longer another conscious cultist in sight. She and Lyon immediately brought down the wall.

"That was fast!" Lyon commented.

"We're not done yet. We have to go save one of the slaves-" Ur started.

"Please help me! I need to save Jellal!" pleaded the scarlet-haired new Mage.

"Erza!" Natsu smiled.

This made Erza lean back a little. "How do you know my name?"

Ultear stared at Natsu. "We'll explain later. For now, let's go save Jellal," she commented.

"But I'm here already..."

Erza, recognizing the voice, turned and saw Jellal walking towards her, perfectly fine. The whole room was silent (then again, what are you supposed to say when a normal boy breaks out of Magic-restricting cuffs on his own in such a short time, after being tortured for hours?). Then he fell down on his face and everyone gasped. His friends ran over to him. What they didn't notice was that a red-haired man just jumped out of Jellal's body. Ultear was busy looking for the Oracion Seis kids and Erza was too busy examining Jellal, so only Natsu noticed. He looked at Kai, who smiled and said, "Natsu, follow me." Natsu did so, walking away from the crowd, but everyone was busy waiting for Jellal to wake up. They went behind a rock and sat down.

"Hey, Natsu, we don't have much time, so I'll just tell you now that I live in Magnolia, that Erza can see me, and that Igneel had to leave. Actually, to tell you the truth, he left a long time ago, back before Deliora attacked," Kai said.

"What? That's impossible! I was riding on Igneel when Deliora attacked!" Natsu protested.

"Igneel was gone the night before Deliora struck. The next day, that was me using my Magic to transform into Igneel while, at the same time, make an illusion of Igneel appear so that people see Igneel when, really, it's me," Kai confessed.

"Huh?" Natsu asked, confused.

"Sorry I lied to you. I know this is a lot to process, but don't worry. All we have to do is fly to Magnolia and you can join Fairy Tail with everyone. Besides, Igneel has his reasons. No need to worry about him or why he left," Kai apologized.

Natsu stared into space for a moment, lost in thought. They heard footsteps and stood up. Erza walked around the boulder and widened her eye. "K-Kai? What are you doing here?" she asked.

"I just explained something important to Natsu. I have to leave now, though," Kai explained.

"Aw, why? I want to introduce you to everyone!" Erza whined.

"Don't worry, you'll get your chance. Just stay with Natsu. He told me he was going to have Igneel fly everyone to Magnolia, right Natsu?" Kai said, giving Natsu a look.

"Yeah," Natsu responded after a second.

"Thank you for saving us," Erza looked at him for a second, then said, "Jellal woke up. Let's go say hi," Erza said, taking Natsu by the hand and running him to Jellal, leaving Kai to go outside and use his Transformation Magic.

::::::::::::::::::

I originally was making a huge chapter, but I changed my mind and split it into two smaller chapters. Also, the poll is now on my profile page (sorry, I forgot you were supposed to change the settings for the poll to be there), so go and vote, please. The poll is asking whether I should make the romance of this story M-rated. Anyway, bye!


	5. Ch 4: Joining Fairy Tail

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.

:::::::::::::::

Currently, it is two hours after Jellal passing out. He woke up, but had no memory of escaping. Now, he and Erza were sitting on top of "Igneel" along with Natsu, Ur, and Gray, and he was learning what happened, and he thanked them for saving him and his friends. Lyon wanted to sit in the titanic boat that the dragon was carrying, which held the now-free slaves, and Ultear wanted to talk to the would've-been Oracion Seis about how they have a lot of Magic energy inside them, with the would've-been Cobra, or Erik, as he liked to be called, confessing that he wanted to have Poison Dragon Slayer Lacrima implanted in his body. He also had his little snake friend with him, whom he had named Cubelios. Ultear could sense that Cubelios was cursed somehow, but decided not to say anything yet. The now-not-part-of-a-crazy-powerful-Dark-Guild kids also met Erza's friends, at Ultear's urging. Wally reunited with his brother, Richard, while also meeting Erik, who laughed when Cubelios bit his nose and he freaked out as if it was poisonous. Sorano met Simon and Milliana, the former bonding over missing their younger sisters and the latter becoming a sort of older-sister-figure-younger-sister-figure pair. Sho met Sawyer, who would've become Racer, and was inspired by his ambition to learn Magic that would make him reeeeeeeeally fast and vowed to learn the same Magic with him. Even the kid who would've been Midnight, known as Macbeth, talked to Ultear and smiled for the first time in a really long while. They also all met each other (again, at Ultear's urging) and they became friends, just like the Oracion Seis from Ultear's timeline. Details, details, I know, but describing their relationships now would become handy when stuff happens later.

Erza was on top talking with Natsu and Jellal. Ultear had told Natsu to explain that they were from the future.

"No way..." Jellal remarked, amazed.

"From the future?" Erza asked, stunned.

"Yeah. The Jellal and Erza from then were my friends, too. I had a lot of friends, but they were each special," Natsu replied calmly.

"Wow! What was I like?" Erza asked. Natsu cringed, which elicited a look of confusion from her and Jellal.

"Well, you were... kinda scary, actually. Really strong, but kinda scary," Natsu answered cautiously, causing Erza to pout. Ultear chose this time to come back up and sit on "Igneel's" back.

"I put all the slaves to sleep. They probably need it," she commented, before seeing the situation above. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"Natsu said the future me was scary," Erza said.

"Well, I remember that Erza, too. I didn't know her very well, but she seemed like the disciplinarian of Fairy Tail. She wore armor every time I saw her, and often stopped fights between Natsu and Gray. I wasn't scared of her, but, to be fair, it could just be me not spending time around her," Ultear answered, choosing her words perked up at this.

"So I'm not scary?" she asked.

"Of course not!" Jellal chimed in. Turning to Ultear, he asked, "So, what about me? What was I like?"

Now Ultear cringed. "Uhhh... you might want to wait until we're in private for that... It might not be something you want others to hear..." she said slowly.

"What? Were we both terrible people in the future?" Erza asked, negatively amazed at the sheer bad luck.

"No!" both Natsu and Ultear exclaimed at once, causing the other two to jump.

"Erza was really strong! She was brave and warm and passionate and would protect her comrades and guildmates, no matter what! She was one of my best friends!" Natsu exclaimed, causing Erza to blush a little, something Jellal detected.

"And I have known that Jellal for a while, and he was very kind and strong. He may have done things he regretted, but what I admire most about him was that he forgave himself for all that he had done. We worked together with a bunch of other Mages to help bring down Dark Guilds," Ultear added.

"'Dark Guilds'?" Erza asked.

"They are guilds that aren't officially recognized as Guilds by the Magic Council, and they often do illegal and dangerous things. You know what Guilds are, right?" Ultear explained.

"Yeah. Grandpa Rob was in a Guild called Fairy Tail. I want to join that Guild so badly!" she said.

"Oh, man, what a coincidence! Because that's exactly where we were going!" Natsu commented, which made Erza gasp in eagerness.

"Really?" she asked, excited and smiling like she was her future self and was eating a special strawberry cake.

"Yep! I am a member of Fairy Tail. Although, now, I haven't joined yet... Ah! So confusing!" You could see the steam coming out of Natsu's ears.

"It's not that complicated, Natsu. When did you join the first time?" Ultear asked.

"I would've joined in X777, the same year Igneel left..." Natsu said, which caused him to become downtrodden.

"So now you'll be joining a year earlier this time," Ultear finished.

"Who's Igneel?" Jellal asked.

"He's the dragon we're sitting on right now," Ultear commented.

"What? His name is Igneel?" Erza asked incredulously.

"No. Igneel had to leave earlier this time," Natsu said.

"Really?" Ultear asked, shocked. "Then who are we riding on right now?"

"This is Kai using Transformation Magic to look like Igneel. He did a pretty good job. I couldn't even tell he wasn't the real thing..." Natsu answered.

"K-Kai? But he had to leave! I saw him talking with Natsu!" Erza protested.

"This is Kai? I don't believe you," Ultear said with blunt amazement pointing to the dragon's scaly back.

" _ **Nope, it's really me. I just can't transform into my old form to show you. Unless, you want to have to hang on to my little body as opposed to sitting on the back of a large creature while he flies you to a town, then be my guest**_ **,** " the dragon answered.

"No way! We've been riding on Kai's back this whole time?" Ultear asked incredulously.

"Kai? He's here?" Jellal asked.

"You know him too?" Natsu asked.

"He trained both of us in secret while we were slaves," Erza explained.

"How did he manage that? I can't imagine there being many places to train in secret without getting caught in that tower," Ultear asked.

"He gave us a spell that allows us to become ghosts. All we have to do is touch the tattoo on our bellies and say 'Release!'. Then we become ghosts, and, when we return to our bodies, everything we experienced as a ghost will become physical experiences as well once we return to our bodies. Sure, we have to endure extreme cold and extreme pain for every wall we have to phase through once we return to our bodies, but we've gotten used to it now," Jellal explained.

"Wow. That's awesome!" Natsu complimented.

"Why didn't you give us tattoos like that?" she asked, turning to the dragon.

" _ **Hey, I brought you back in time, young lady. I think I've given you a lot already. Besides, you have tattoos that can summon Celestial Spirits. Don't those count** **?**_ " he countered, not turning away from his flying.

" _He's_ the one who brought you back in time?" Jellal and Erza asked, amazed.

"Yeah," Natsu answered.

" _ **We're close to Magnolia,**_ " Kai said, lowering his altitude. He landed in an open field, setting down the boat of sleeping slaves (and the group from the mountains). Magnolia was visible through the trees.

"Why are we getting off here?" Jellal asked, getting off. Once everyone was off, he transformed back into his Kai form in a puff of pink smoke.

"Because if a dragon flew into Magnolia, set down, and let off a bunch of oddly-dressed passengers before transforming into a human, there'd be a huge panic," Kai answered, panting.

"But nobody would see you. You're a ghost..." Ultear argued.

"I was using my Illusion Magic on everyone who would be able to see me within a fifty-mile radius. I was simply countering the drawback of the Arc of Spirits by making anyone who would normally not be able to see me... well, see me. I decided to make it appear as if a Dragon was flying a bunch of kids and holding a boat filled with slaves, which of course, was how it would appear to those who have interacted with me. That way, I wouldn't cause a panic when people jump to conclusions," Kai explained.

"Ah, I see," he answered.

"Why did we stop? What happened?" Ur asked groggily, rubbing her eyes with her knuckle.

"It's night now. We're at Magnolia," Ultear said.

"Oh? That's good. We can go now," Lyon said next to her. Then they both fell back

Natsu sighed. "Cover your ears, guys," he warned. They did so, and he pounded his fists together.

" **Demonic Fire Dragon Mode,** " he called, horns growing out of his head and scales forming around them. He turned around, facing the town, then inhaled an ungodly amount of air before letting out a huge roar. It echoed across Magnolia, silencing the loud, busy place and startling the slaves awake.

"Ow! What was that for, hothead?" Gray cursed, clutching his ears.

"That was too loud!" Ur shouted.

"This ringing is going to be here for a while!" Lyon commented dumbly, also clutching his ears.

 **Meanwhile, in the Fairy Tail Guild Building...**

It was now nighttime in the Fairy Tail guild. The only ones there were the Master, the barmaid, Cana, Levy, Macao, and Wakaba.

"GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Master Makarov jerked his head at hearing the loud roar. In fact, so did Cana, Macao, Wakaba, and Levy, who were sitting at a table together.

"What was that?" Cana asked.

"I have no idea..." Macao said.

"It sounded like a monster..." Levy commented.

"I think it came from the forest," Wakaba added."

Everyone, stay here," Makarov commanded, getting off of the bar to go investigate.

"Be careful, Master," Levy warned.

It didn't take long for the Guild Master of Fairy Tail to search for the source of the sound, and then stumble upon a bunch of kids and a few adults. Most of them were dressed poorly, wearing only a white-ish gown and cuffs. Most of them were awake, yelling at a pink haired boy. He walked in on the scene.

"Is everyone okay? I heard a loud roar and thought there was a beast in these woods," he asked.

"That was him," a black-haired girl said calmly, pointing to the pink-haired old man blinked twice.

"Come again?" Makarov asked.

"He was the one that roared," a blue-haired boy next to her said.

"Really?" Makarov looked at Natsu, who was currently getting smacked upside the head by Sorano. "How did he do that?" he asked, astonished.

"He's a really powerful Mage," a girl with an eyepatch and deep red hair said next to the bluehead.

"I can kind of tell. He has so much Magic power inside him, I'm surprised he's able to control it," Makarov commented.

"My name's Ultear Milkovich. They are Jellal, Erza, and Natsu, who roared for no apparent reason." She introduced herself and the other three, pointing to each as she said their names, glaring at Natsu. She then led Makarov over to Erza's friends from the Tower of Heaven (introducing the fact that the ones in gowns were slaves not 2 days ago), the Seis group (the ones who would've become the Oracion Seis), and the Ice group (Ur, Gray, and Lyon), with Makarov noting how much Magic power they had, and commenting that he had heard Ur's name somewhere before. After that, he led everyone to Fairy Tail's Guild Hall, with Natsu, Ultear, Gray, Lyon, Ur, Erza, and Jellal behind him, the Seis group and the rest of Erza's friends behind them, and the rest of the slaves behind _them_.

It took a little more time to get to the Guild Hall than when Makarov was alone, but they made it, all the while he was telling them about Fairy Tail, about how they were all kind people, about how they do 'whatever they want', about how they were always happy, even on boring days. Then they made it to the place itself and most of the slaves filed in behind the front-liners. The four people present looked to see the scene. The old men asked the Master what was going on and why these kids and adults were dressed so poorly as the other slaves found places to sit at the tables at the Master's request. However, Cana was staring at one particular person, with wide eyes. Levy noticed and looked her direction.

"Cana? What's wrong?" she asked.

"I-It's... Natsu," Cana said, still kind of silent.

"Who?" She followed her friend's finger. "The pink-haired boy? Do you know him?"

However, Cana ignored her friend. She jumped off her seat and ran towards him, hugging him.

Levy, meanwhile, noticed that her friend had dropped a card. She picked it up, and it looked very familiar...

"Natsu!" she had said.

"Hey, Cana. How've you been?" he asked turned her head after answering his question, saw two more familiar figures (along with Levy being right behind her, handing her back her Dream Card).

"Ultear-nee-san! Kai-sensei!" she cheered, just as joyously, hugging each of them too.

"You all know Cana?" Makarov asked.

"Yeah. I taught her Card Magic and how to tell fortunes. I'm quite proud of her," Kai commented, causing Cana to smile from her praise.

"That was you?" Macao asked, now standing behind Cana.

"Of course. I'm sure you've seen the Dream Card, right?" Kai asked, holding one up.

"Yeah... wait, how do you know about that?" he asked, slightly amazed.

"Oh, man... Dude, I _made_ those cards. Since they're basically connected gateways to one pocket dimension, I can tell who entered the Dream Forest when they did simply by checking the Magic energy of each card. I also get visual footage and a name. You must be... Maki?" he explained.

"It's Macao!" he admonished, blushing a little.

"Oh, I guess I heard Cana wrong when looking at the footage. Sorry," Kai apologized sheepishly.

"Who're you?" Gray asked, coming up behind Kai. He turned his head.

"Oh. Hey, Gray. My name is Kai. I forgot that you can see me now. I've trained Natsu, Ultear, and Cana here. Plus, I gave _her_ a puzzle," he summarized, pointing to Levy for that last part.

"That was you? Do you know what that weird ice she used was?" Lyon asked ambitiously.

"I do. It's Ice Devil Slayer Magic. It works like Dragon Slayer Magic, but its purpose is for slaying demons. Other than that, it's just like its counterparts," Kai explained.

"'Devil Slayer Magic'?" Macao repeated.

"Yep. Never heard of it before, have you?" he asked.

"Never," Macao affirmed.

"Okay. Well, I can tell you that these two killed the demon Deliora with this Magic. You might hear news of it later," Kai bragged, pointing to Natsu and Ultear.

"Deliora? What's that?" Cana asked.

"A demon from the Books of Zeref. He was supposed to be immune to Magic, but I guess knowledge of Devil Slayers is not common," Kai mused.

Cana gasped in amazement. "Wow! They're that strong?" she asked.

"You bet!" Natsu laughed confidently.

"What, did you think otherwise?" Ultear said with mock hurt, smiling.

"No... I just thought... you were all imaginary..." Cana answered sheepishly.

Kai chuckled. "Don't worry, we're real," he consoled her.

"Does that mean Lucy is real too?" Cana asked excitedly.

"Yeah. Let's go visit her sometime!" Kai nodded in approval.

Cana nodded, smiling back. "Mm!" she affirmed.

"Don't forget us!" Natsu chimed in.

"Umm... that card..." Levy commented, pointing to the Dream Card in Kai's hand. Macao looked at her.

"Oh, Levy, he gave you a puzzle, right?" he asked.

"Yeah. It took me half a year but I finally solved it... uh, almost. And he gave me a bookmark, but..." Levy reached into her bag and pulled out an old leather book with gold-lined pages. Stuck near the end was a card that, upon closer inspection, was identical to the one in Kai's hand. She opened the book and took it out, marking her place with her thumb. She held up the card, showing it to Kai.

"Oh, I was wondering where I put that! I was going to give it to you later, but I guess I spaced out. Oh well!" Kai explained pathetically, smiling.

"You scatterbrain!" Gray admonished coldly.

"Yeah, yeah, stripper," Kai said sarcastically.

"Quit calling me that!" he complained.

"So, what exactly are these cards?" Levy asked.

"Well, they are called Dream Cards. If you touch that seal on the back with three fingers, your body falls asleep while your spirit gets whisked away to the Dream Forest, a pocket dimension that connects all these cards. Right now, there are six Dream Cards in the world: mine, Ultear's, Natsu's, Cana's, and yours, along with that of another girl name Lucy. We usually enter them when we go to bed and talk," Kai explained.

"Oh. That's cool!" she said.

Kai then looked down and noticed something. "Hey, the pages are glowing," he told her. She lifted the book and noticed that he was right.

"What does that mean?" Levy asked.

"I think you've almost solved it. Read what it says next," Kai gestured.

"Umm... 'He who knows to think knows not to think always'. Cryptic. Very cryptic," she said.

"Do you get it?" he asked. The entire group (Macao, Kai, Natsu, Ultear, Ur, Lyon, Gray Cana, Erza, Jellal, and Makarov [Wakaba was currently talking with the Seis kids]) watched on in fascination.

"Definitely," she answered, taking out a Magic pen. "'And he who knows not to think knows thought not'," she dictated as she wrote. Once she was done, the book exploded in a flash of light, making the group cover their faces except for Levy. When the smoke disappeared, Levy seemed awfully transfixed on the open space in front of her. Macao glared at Kai.

"What was that?" he asked cautiously.

"Look at her eyes," Kai replied calmly. He did so and noticed Magic Circles within her pupils.

"That's... Learning Magic! It's a very ancient Lost Magic that teaches a person a certain Magic in the space of two minutes. How old was that book?" Makarov asked, amazed as he looked from Levy's eyes to Kai.

"It was very common when I got it. It's about five hundred years old, give or take a decade," Kai answered.

"No wonder. I almost didn't recognize that Magic. What's she being taught?" he asked.

"Trait Script, a Lost Letter Magic," Kai answered.

"'Trait Script'? I've never even heard of it. What does it do exactly?" Makarov asked, expression serious.

"It allows the user to temporarily add, remove, or change most material traits of an object or person. The drawback is that it drains the user's Magic power as long as there is at least one change still in effect, so they can't keep it up forever," Kai explained.

"That doesn't seem too serious," Makarov said, relieved.

"Remember that, if a Mage runs out of Magic, it could get dangerous for them," Kai reminded.

"So it doesn't stop draining at all unless the user deactivates the trait, huh?" Makarov summarized.

"You got it," Kai affirmed. Levy awoke from the trance and paused a moment, then said, "Wow. Trait Script is so cool! I have to try it!" with stars in her eyes. She turned to Natsu and called out, " **Trait Script: Physical Age, 17,** " while writing it in fancy-script, gold, glowing letters in the air. Once she cast it, Natsu grew taller, filling out more to look like he used to before Kai showed up. His clothes started ripping a little bit as they nearly strangled him, making Natsu freak out.

"Turn it off, turn it off!" he begged, smacking his leg and panting.

Now, considering their ages, it would make complete sense for Ultear to react the way she did... by staring at him and blushing a little. But why the others reacted even more intensely than her can be put up for guesses. They were admiring his body, even though they shouldn't have at that age. Maybe it's normal? Probably not, actually. Of course, this did not go unnoticed by Master Makarov, Macao, Kai, and Ur, who smiled at the girls' reactions.

Eventually, Levy snapped out of it and, with a wave of her pen, spelled " **Release,** " in the air with the fancy script writing, which shrunk Natsu back to his 12-year-old form. His clothes didn't change at all, though.

"Aw man," he lamented, staring at his slightly ripped vest before putting it back on.

Makarov noticed the girls were still silent, so he cleared his throat and changed the subject. "Right. Well, congratulations, Levy. Anyway, Natsu, you said you wanted to join, right?" he asked.

"Right!" Natsu smiled.

"Alright. I approve! Now, does anyone else feel like joining?" Makarov asked cheerfully.

"Sounds like fun," Ultear replied, smiling.

"Count us in!" Lyon and Gray said at once.

"Me too!" Erza added.

"I'm joining!" Jellal replied.

"Eh, why not? It'd probably be fun to try. Besides, it would take forever to get back to the mountains from here..." Ur said nonchalantly, smiling all the same.

"Don't forget me! I may be a ghost, but I still wanna join!" Kai chimed in.

Makarov held his smile. "All of you? Well, okay then! Let's go get you your guild marks!" he said, cheery still.

"Oh yeah, my sister wanted to join too..." Kai spoke up.

"Huh? I didn't know you had a sister," Natsu noted.

"Why does she want to join?" Makarov asked.

"Well, she wanted to help me too, so she went overseas from our apartment every day for the past few years to train Erza and Jellal. Let me introduce you." Kai then clapped his hands together and glowed with Magic. The glow eventually subsided, and a new figure stepped out from behind Kai... at least, that's what it seemed like to Erza and Jellal. Nobody else saw her until she put up her hand and a Magic Circle formed.

"Whoa! She just appeared out of nowhere!" Natsu remarked, amazed.

"Can you hear me?" she asked.

"Yep!" Natsu replied. The rest of them affirmed this, just as shocked as Natsu was.

"Okay. Well, hello. My name is Yuki. I am Kai's sister. I trained Erza and Jellal and gave them the Spirit Shift spell." Here she turned to the two of them and said, "I'm terribly sorry I lied to you. It's just that Kai couldn't make the trip every day since he lived here in Magnolia, and he was busy most days to boot. Ghosts don't eat, but it does get tough when someone's eating cake right in front of you and they're totally enjoying it. But I digress." She turned to Makarov. "May I join Fairy Tail too?" she asked.

"Well, I don't see why not."

...

 **The next day...**

There were no slaves in Fairy Tail the next day. Only former slaves, of course, but there were far fewer in the building than yesterday. Most of the slaves had their reasons for not wanting to learn Magic, whether it was because they didn't want to or they were lazy and sedentary or some other reason. All the former slaves were given publicity by the locals and provided clothing, including the ones that decided to stay with Fairy Tail, before they were taken to their homes by the Magic Council (this obviously excluded the ones that stayed).

There was still a good number of kids who stayed in Fairy Tail, just in a 'pre'-Mage status of sorts. Natsu got his guild mark on his right shoulder, just like before, Ultear put hers on her left hand, Jellal put it on the other side of his face (so his tattoo had a friend), Erza put it on her right bicep, Ur had hers placed on the side of her neck, Gray got his on his right pec (so, his chest), Lyon got his put on his neck like Ur, and Yuki and Kai each put theirs over their eyes. Not to mention, Macbeth (Midnight), Sorano (Angel), Erik (Cobra), Sawyer (Racer), and Richard (Hoteye) all got theirs put in the same place: their right forearms. Also, Erza's friends had joined. Of them, Milliana put hers on her arm, right where her shoulder was, Simon had his on his cheek, right above his new metal jaw, Wally had is put on his wrist, and Sho put his on his right bicep, just like Erza.

Now, the Seis kids were sitting at one table this morning, having been provided with clothing, talking about the day they wanted to have that day. That, however, is a story for another time.

Meanwhile, at another table, all those who knew Kai before joining Fairy Tail (Natsu, Ultear, Erza, Jellal, Levy), along with Ur, Gray, Lyon, Macao, Wakaba (as Macao's friend), Yuki, and Kai himself, were sitting and talking about their Magics (and about how easy it was to make Gray and Natsu fight) and Cana, Levy, Erza, and Jellal learned of Gray's stripping habit the hard way... But, here's where the conversation started off...

Kai and Yuki sat down at the table that morning, which was closest to the bar. Most of the group (mentioned above) was already sitting there, looking at him. Makarov was standing on the bar and everyone was looking at him, silent. He noticed the two newcomers arrive, and smiled.

"Ah, perfect timing. Everyone! I have an announcement. First off, last night, there was a dragon sighting behind the forest in Magnolia, but there wasn't a dragon when I got there."

"I heard about that dragon sighting. What was it people saw then, if it wasn't a dragon?" asked a young Freed Justine.

"It was our new guild members! Would all of you that joined the guild last night please come up here?" Makarov asked. They did so, and stood by the bar. Gray was wearing clothes for once.

"Wait, what about that loud roar? That sounded scary. What was it that roared last night?" asked a young Droy, who was sitting at the table closest to Levy alongside his 'love rival' Jet.

"That was him," Ultear said bluntly and calmly, pointing to Natsu, who smiled and waved his hand. Everyone blinked twice, sporting a blank face.

"You're kidding, right? That little kid made such a loud noise? Yeah, right," said a young Laxus Dreyar from his seat across from Freed.

"Laxus!" Freed reprimanded.

"You wanna fight, headphones?!" Natsu yelled. Laxus simply stood up.

"I accept your challenge. Come at me... unless you're scared," Laxus taunted, standing in open space, not even putting up his guard. The other members backed away.

"Of course not!" Natsu yelled, running toward Laxus, holding a fist high. Laxus charged up his fists and used his speed to quickly get behind Natsu. He noticed, however, and kept running for just a second more, out of the way of Laxus' punch. Laxus simply ran up to Natsu again, only this time, Natsu turned around and met Laxus' punch with his own. Laxus smirked.

"And here I was thinking you were chickening out. But you didn't use any Magic, kid. Now you're open!" Laxus taunted, smirking. His fist kept charging up with the crowd came concerned comments like "Oh no!", "Laxus is going to electrocute that kid!", "I hope he's going to be alright," and "Laxus, stop this now!" Laxus simply smiled more as his fist charged up even more.

Natsu didn't flinch. He smiled. "I don't think so!" Putting his face close to their fists, he started inhaling Laxus' lightning, much to the shock of the Lightning Dragon Slayer.

"What? How are you eating my lightning? Don't tell me..." he ranted, astonished.

" **Lightning Flame Dragon Mode,** " Natsu called out, before he became engulfed in fire and lightning. Everyone gasped in amazement, including Laxus. Then, Laxus noticed that Natsu had turned his punch into a punch-grab so fast nobody could see. He felt he must have looked stupid, his fist unable to move because of a hand smaller than his fist. Natsu only grinned as he took Laxus' fist and used it to slam Laxus into the ground while bending his arm over his head, burying him in the floor face-first. He couldn't get up, since Natsu had put his foot on Laxus' back. Eventually, Laxus gave up, and went limp. Natsu took his foot off the guy's back, but Laxus was just down, not out, as the saying goes. He grabbed Natsu's leg with his free hand when Natsu wasn't on his guard. He peeled his face up from the ground and chuckled evilly.

"You... you... little..." He was about to move his arm, to counterattack, but, all of a sudden, a cloud of smoke appeared and Laxus felt the leg in his hand disappear, much to his surprise. He looked up just in time to see the cloud vanish and two little blue creatures hovering there in place of Natsu. These creatures laughed at Laxus before hovering away, towards the bar. Laxus got out of the crater and looked to see the blue creatures floating next to Natsu and a man in a suit and tie.

"Wow, Gemini, that was awesome! I wish you let me do that, though," Natsu smiled, talking to the blue creatures and pouting the second part.

" _ **Hehehe, sorry! Still, it was fun slamming Laxus into the ground like that! By the way, thanks for bringing us, Leo-sama** **,**_ " they said, aiming the last part to the suited man.

"No problem, Gemini," said the suited man, smiling as the two creatures disappeared. Laxus got up.

"So, you _did_ chicken out? Wimp," Laxus taunted.

"Oh, shut it, lightning-breath. Unless you want to get beaten by the real me. Though, I have to warn you, Gemini copied me pretty well," Natsu replied, smiling.

"Oh yeah? I didn't see that stupid scarf on your body double," Laxus shot back.

"That's because it's one of a kind. A present from my dad," Natsu replied innocently.

"Was your dad as weak as you?" Laxus taunted again. That seemed to get a reaction, since he was grabbing Laxus by the neck of his shirt in the next instant.

"Don't you ever insult Igneel again, got it?" he threatened angrily.

"Oh? And who's going to stop me? You?" he mused.

"That's enough, you two!" Makarov yelled, now grabbing Laxus with his enlarged hand.

"Yeah! Shut up, Laxus!" Natsu cheered.

"Why you...!" Laxus cussed.

As Makarov dragged Laxus away, Natsu and everyone who was standing up sat back down. The guild was dumbfounded, but they eventually stopped staring into empty space or at the crater and returned to what they were doing.

"Wow, you are really strong!" Cana noted.

"Wow..." Levy said.

"He didn't seem nice, did he?" Jellal asked rhetorically.

"I'm glad Natsu put him in his place," Erza smiled.

Then Gray was in his boxers, and that was where those four first witnessed Gray's... uh, problem.

"Yo, icicle, why are you naked again?" Natsu whined.

"What are you talking about? It's rude to take off your clothes in front of company! Why would I do that?" he asked, standing up and banging on the table. Clearly, he was oblivious of his previous incidents. Meanwhile, Erza, Cana, and Levy were blushing profusely and staring wide-eyed at the scene while Jellal averted his gaze to the girls next to him upon noticing. Lyon was holding back laughter.

"Why do I not believe you?" Ur teased admonishingly.

"What do you mean? It's common sense!" he shot back.

"Is it?" Ultear teased, speaking innocently. It was getting clearly harder for Lyon to hold back his laughter.

"Yes! You'd have to be an idiot not to know that!" he practically shouted, standing on the chair.

Then Lyon just started laughing uncontrollably and loudly, causing a couple people to look their way. This made Ur, Ultear, and even Natsu start chuckling/giggling and then they started laughing.

"What's so funny?" Gray spat out.

"You're being such a hypocrite right now!" Lyon said in between his laughs.

"You just called yourself an idiot!" Natsu was now when Gray decided to look down and notice he was indeed in just his boxers and his clothes were on the ground. Freaking out from shock, he picked up his clothes and got back into them quickly. Ur chuckled.

"We were wondering when you would catch on," she mused, smiling. What she hadn't noticed was that the Guild Hall was slowly going silent. The kids (minus Natsu, Gray, and Lyon, the latter two of whom were just shocked and the former confused about everyone else's reactions) started blushing as red as Erza's hair (cliché'd for a fanfiction, I know) as she finally noticed something was wrong.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Ummm... why are you naked now?" Natsu asked , she wasn't nearly as oblivious as Gray was (though, to his credit, nobody was teasing her), and she looked down and noticed she was in her training gear, and her clothes were on the seat next to her. Screaming, she quickly put her clothes back on.

"Oh, man. First Gray, now Ur... I hope I'm not next!" he said, not noticing his own actions.

"Too late," Ultear answered bluntly. Lyon looked down and noticed he was currently trying to take off his pants, while his shirt was on the table. Panicking, he reversed the process.

"Now, what was that earlier?" Gray asked sarcastically.

"SHUT UP! WE'VE DEVELOPED THIS WEIRD HABIT BECAUSE OF YOU!" they yelled at the same time.

"Don't blame this on me! This was your fault," he admonished back.

"I feel like I've heard those exact words somewhere before..." Ultear noted calmly, tapping her chin.

Eventually, one of the silent kids brought up the courage to speak. Cana finally asked, "W-What was that about?"

"Oh, Gray has a stripping habit because, when we were learning from Mom and training outside, we would do it in only our underwear, and in our case underwear and bra. Then he eventually just started randomly stripping in the streets. But I have no idea why I don't have that weird habit. I trained with them, but I know where my clothes are..." she explained. After a couple of seconds, she noticed out of the corner of her eye something was off again. Gray, Lyon, and Ur, were still fighting, but something was different. "Mom, Lyon, Gray, you're all naked again..." she warned them. They all looked down and their mouths were hanging open in shock. Then they looked around for their clothes and noticed Ultear and focused their gazes on her. "What's wrong? Where are your clothes?" she asked.

"Why are you wearing my jacket? And our shirts?" Ur asked. Ultear looked down and noticed that she was indeed wearing more layers of clothes.

"What the...? What happened?" she asked.

"Well, while they were fighting, they took off their clothes and you got up and put their clothes on you..." Jellal explained.

"What? So I did develop a weird habit?" she asked casually, the same way one might ask, 'Where did I put my keys?'

"It's an un-stripping habit!" Cana said, hitting the side of her fist into her open palm.

Levy laughed uneasily. "Yep, that's what it looks like..." she commented.

:::::::::::::::::::


	6. Ch 5: Attracting New Members

Yo! Before you read the rest of the chapter, I just wanted to state all the characters' current ages as of X776, which was the year the Tower of Heaven chapter I wrote took place. This is supposed to be taken into consideration before you read _this_ chapter, because it jumps around various times within 8 years (all in chronological order) since, on their own, they aren't as major to the characters as the Tower of Heaven or Deliora's attack were.

Natsu (physically): 13

Ultear (physically): 14

Lucy: 8

Cana: 12

Levy: 11

Erza: 13

Jellal: 13

Ur: 28

Gray: 12

Lyon: 13

Laxus: 17

Freed: 14

Makarov: old

Also, I figured out how to make horizontal lines (really, now, I feel stupid for not noticing it before). Plus, if you read that last sentence in a British accent, it sounds more like a joke (so, in other words, funny).

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

* * *

Now, when we left last time, everyone had just joined Fairy Tail. Many small things occurred in the years after, but they would be too important to simply not mention when put together. So, here I present... well, these "small" things that occurred over the next 6 years.

 **X776, July 1...**

Currently, Cana fell onto her bed, too tired to fall asleep ceremoniously. Then again, finding out that three of your new friends have a stripping habit _and_ that a fourth has an un-stripping habit is quite tiring for one day. She took out her card deck case, which she used because she didn't want to deal with the mess that comes after dropping a deck of cards, and took out a card from the lid, which slid out the side of the case. She smiled at her Dream Card before getting under the covers and tapping the seal on the back with three fingers, activating the card. It glowed, and Cana felt the familiar temporary-cold feeling she felt from her spirit separating from her body. Then she felt the other also-familiar sensation of being pulled upward really fast and really hard for about one second. It kind of hurt, but she wasn't surprised by it anymore, and she never actually received injuries from it (do ghosts even get hurt anyway?), so she had no problems with it. She simply closed her eyes now, at least until the whole second was over. Tonight was no different, so she clamped her eyes shut until the cold sensation of being a ghost was replaced with the natural temperature of being a ghost in a ghost dimension ("natural" meaning "like how humans feel in a human dimension"). She opened her eyes and saw their usual clearing in the forest, a vast field you wouldn't expect to find in the middle of a forest. Most of her usual friends were there: Kai, Natsu, and Ultear. Yuki, Levy, Erza and Jellal were there, too, marveling at the place they found themselves in. They were not lying down on the grass looking up at the sun, though. They were sitting at a park table with a lot of food, almost like a feast. She greeted them and asked what all the food was for, sitting next to Kai. They chatted about how it was a special day for one of their friends (and someone Levy, Erza and Jellal would be meeting for the first time). They also incorporated into their conversation the fact that it was the first time using a Dream Card and being in the Dream Forest for the three newcomers, how Erza should go to Fairy Tail's medic to get a new eye, the fact that Natsu would be summoning Aquarius for the special occasion, and how they were going to tell Lucy the truth about how they were real ("And nothing else!"). They sat like this for a while.

Now, Cana groaned. "When is she going to get here? This stuff looks good! I can't believe this is all for Lucy-chan!" she complained.

"Now, now, there's enough for everyone, Cana. Don't complain that the food looks good. It might hurt my pride," Yuki joked.

"I can't believe you got used to this place so quickly," Levy deadpanned.

"Oh, but when you live like we do, you stop getting surprised so easily," Yuki answered, smiling.

"'Live like you do'? What does that mean?" Jellal asked.

"Oh, we'll tell you some other time. But this is not the day for us to show off. This is Lucy's day! Let's be happy for her!" Yuki told him, aiming the last part at the table.

"Well said, sister," Kai nodded, smirking.

"Wait, how are we going to eat all of this? I get that it's a lot of food for a lot of people, but still, aren't we going to get full eventually?" Jellal asked.

"Yeah. I don't want to get fat..." Erza added, looking down and patting her stomach.

Kai chuckled. "This is your first time eating ghost food, isn't it? Well, the funny thing about ghosts... our sustenance is memories. Not ghost matter. We don't ever feel hungry or full unless we want to make memories or we have enough. It takes a really painful desire to have more memories or a really painful regret of not having enough memories to have the same hunger as a person who missed breakfast. Not to mention, this ghost food was prepared without incorporating memories, so we wouldn't feel full eating until it's all gone. Ghost matter actually reacts differently with memories involved, but ghost food still tastes good either way. The memories just add a... unique element to the food. Spirit cooking is, in itself, an art form, isn't it?" he asked.

"Wow. It's truly that complicated?" Erza asked.

"All I'm hearing is that I can eat as much as I want!" Natsu cheered, smiling.

Ultear sighed. "Remember, Natsu, you are not the guest of honor. At least try to eat as slowly as Lucy, okay?" she commanded.

"Okay..." Natsu grumbled.

Suddenly, they heard a set of feet hitting the ground, landing on the grass. They all turned their attention to the guest of honor, who was letting her blond hair fall to the side as she tilted her head cutely in confusion.

"Hello, everyone. Who are those four? What's this?" she asked.

"This is for you," Cana told her, winking as she smirked.

Lucy gasped. "You mean..."

Kai chuckled, smiling again. "Happy Birthday, Lucy."

"Ah, so _she's_ the guest of honor," Jellal noted, getting up to introduce himself. He walked over to Lucy, with Erza, Levy, and Yuki following and gathering around Lucy. He held out his hand. "I'm Jellal Fernandes. Nice to meet you," he said, kneeling to reach her eye level and smiling.

"Likewise, I am Yuki. Kai's my brother," she introduced.

"And I am Erza Scarlet. Nice to meet you," Erza introduced formally.

"Don't forget me! I'm Levy. I'm guessing you met Cana-chan already," Levy chimed in.

"Wow! Nice to meet you all!" Lucy shook each of their hands, smiling. She cringed upon seeing Erza's face (or, to be more specific, her eyepatch). "What happened to your eye?" she asked innocently.

Erza's smiling face weakened for a second as she said, "I would rather not discuss it now. Let's not spoil your birthday, shall we?"

Lucy nodded in understanding. "Mm!" she affirmed, smiling.

With that, the four joined the table, with Lucy taking her seat at the head of the table. They certainly enjoyed themselves over the night. They ate, laughed, played, talked, and even just lie down in the grass and stare up at the cloudless sky. This was their last activity, seeing as that is what they were doing now. From left to right lie Jellal, Erza, Levy, Cana, Natsu, Lucy, Ultear, Yuki, and Kai. They just stared at the sky. Lucy sighed in happiness.

"This is the best birthday present ever! Thank you all so much!" Lucy smiled gratefully.

"Of course! It _is_ your birthday and we _are_ your friends, after all. Something like this is nothing. Sorry we couldn't get you presents, though," Kai answered back.

"It's okay. This is something I'll never forget! And I don't need to be pampered," Lucy said innocently.

"Of course not, Princess," came a voice from behind them. They craned their necks up to see three figures.

"Oh, Virgo, Loke, Aquarius. I almost forgot to summon you," Natsu noted.

"Aquarius!" Lucy cheered. Then she stopped and pointed to Loke and Virgo. "Are you friends of hers?" she asked innocently.

"Sort of," Loke admitted, smirking.

"'Sort of'?" Lucy repeated, confused.

Aquarius sighed, annoyed. "It's not important, brat!" she said with irritation.

"Yes, Aquarius!" Lucy flinched, scared.

"You really should stop doing that, Aquarius," Natsu told her matter-of-factly.

"Tch," she replied, looking away. Natsu cocked his eyebrow for a second, confused, before looking at the other two spirits.

"So, what about you two? What's the occasion?" Natsu asked them.

"We wanted to see Lucy on her birthday. Virgo wanted to make a contract with her next, so here she is. I just brought her to deliver the news," Loke answered.

"I see," Natsu replied.

"Are you Celestial Spirits? How do you know my name?" Lucy asked, more amazed than concerned.

"Yes we are, Princess. Natsu's told us about you," Virgo answered, smiling.

"Smooth..." Loke complimented quietly, clearly too low for Lucy to hear.

"Cool! Does that mean you wanted to make a contract with me?" Lucy asked.

"Yes," Virgo answered, smiling.

And so, they went through the whole contract process. Lucy wrote down what days she could summon Virgo, et cetera, etcetera. After the three left (and after Aquarius nearly washed away the birthday girl, which would've happened if Natsu and Loke hadn't stopped her), Lucy held Virgo's key, which Virgo had personally given her, to her chest, smiling in happiness.

"Awesome! I guess I got a present anyway! And it's a new friend!" Lucy cheered.

"What about us?" Jellal asked.

"Oh, you're right! I mean _five_ new friends!" Lucy answered.

"You really enjoyed yourself tonight, didn't you?" Kai asked rhetorically, chuckling.

"Mm-hmm! This was the most fun I've had in a long time!" she answered, clearly still elated.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it, Lucy. Remember, enjoy your mother's company, too. She'd probably like to know where you got Virgo's key. Perhaps you should show her the Dream Forest. I'll be here," Kai suggested.

"That's a great idea!" Lucy agreed.

 **And so, the next day, that is exactly what she did. Needless to say, Layla was quite surprised that there was a whole forest she didn't know about inside that card Lucy always carried, but more surprised that it wasn't just a child's imagination and even more surprised that her friend was a ghost... yeah, she was, needless to say, interested. But writing in that part of their story would be... redundant.**

...

* * *

 **X777, July 7**

This was undoubtedly the most important day of all days in those six years. This is what happened when Kai announced that he would be gone for a few days.

"Why?" Levy asked.

"I had some business to take care of. Don't worry, I'll be back soon," Kai assured her. He then walked out the door and started travelling.

 **Heartfilia Conzern**

Kai travelled using Direct Line Magic (which he could use thanks to the Doranbolt inside his head) to first find the Heartfilia Conzern, or, to be more precise, a secret storage room where Layla Heartfilia was lying down alone, coughing. She looked up to see him standing over her.

"You're... Kai? What are you doing here?" she asked.

"Let me guess... you just used a powerful spell that drained all your Magic and now you're suffering Magic Deficiency Syndrome," he joked.

"How did you know?" she coughed.

"Lucky guess. Well, I'll help you now," Kai answered. He held his hand out to the side.

" **Requip: Medic Gun,** " he called out, a white gun appearing in his hand. Pointing both hands upward, he aimed it to the ceiling, shooting it three times. The bullets simply exploded in midair, raining blue sparkles down on them. Then, he arranged his other hand into a pointing gesture and pointed at Layla. A single spot appeared on the clothes on her stomach and the sparkles started to file into Layla's stomach (or, more accurately, her Magic Container) through that point. Layla stared on, shocked, eyes somewhat wide.

"Wh-What? Ethernanos? How are you doing that?" Layla asked.

"Just relax. You're gaining back your strength, right?" Kai asked.

"Y-Yeah..." Layla replied.

"That's probably because your body is 21 years old again," Kai noted.

"What? Younger? How?" Layla asked.

"The spell you were casting would've aged you to death, so I simply de-aged you. Though I went overboard just a little..." Kai said sheepishly.

"But why? I was perfectly fine with dying so everyone else could live..." she asked.

"'We don't die for the ones we love, we live for them.' A very wise girl said that once. The only difference between that situation and this one is that you don't believe you have a choice. Now I have given you a different option. Sure, you still don't have a choice, but at least you get to see your daughter grow up to be a woman. Besides... Finding yourself to be younger can't be too bad, right?" Kai explained.

Layla smiled. "You're right, Kai. Thank you," she said.

"Good. Let's not tell anyone about this," Kai told her.

Layla simply fell over in response. Kai put down his hand, which stopped glowing green. Kai then took a futon from the side and put her unconscious body on it. He then covered her with a blanket and teleported away via his Direct Line.

 **Somewhere in Earthland...**

"What's your name?" asked a 12-year-old blue-haired girl.

"It's Jellal," the boy said. "And you?"

"Wendy," she told him.

"That's a very nice name," Jellal commented.

"Thank you. I like yours too," she commented shyly. They just stood there for a couple of minutes until they heard a thudding in front of them. They looked to see a man trying to balance on a log and not doing a very good job of it. He eventually went from going "Wooaaahhh!" to hitting the ground with an 'umph!'. The two of them went over to the man who was opening his eyes.

"Are you okay?" Jellal asked.

"...Jellal? What are you doing here? And where's your guild mark?" he asked, clearly confused and in a daze.

"Huh?" Jellal asked, shocked and also confused.

"Do you know him?" Wendy asked.

"No..." Jellal stated, lost in thought.

"Oh, wait... you're not Jellal _Fernandes_ , are you?" he asked.

"No, I am not. My name is Jellal Royales," Jellal answered.

"Ah. You must be from Edolas, then," the man noted. This shocked Jellal.

"How do you know of Edolas?" Jellal asked, now concerned.

"'Edolas'? Is that a place?" Wendy asked innocently.

"It is indeed. By the way, I never got _your_ name," the man anwered, looking at Wendy.

"Oh. Wendy Marvell," she said.

"Ah. You're the Sky Dragon Slayer, right? Child of the Sky Dragon Grandine?" he asked.

Wendy gasped. "How did you know that?" she asked.

"'Dragon Slayer'? No way..." Jellal noted, impressed.

"I remember when you were only a baby. Grandine sure was adamant about raising you correctly," he said, chuckling.

Wendy gasped again. "You know Grandeeney? Wow!" she said, amazed.

"It appears you already know a lot about us. Now, what is _your_ name?" Jellal asked.

"Me? I am Kai," he said.

"Now, how did you know about Edolas?" Jellal asked.

"I've been there. Lots of floating islands, right?" Kai answered.

"You are correct. Okay, now why did you think I was supposed to have the mark of a guild when you first saw me?" Jellal asked, sounding more curious than interrogative.

"Because Jellal _Fernandes_ is in the same guild as me. He is your counterpart and his mark is on the other side of his face. He has that same tattoo on his right side as you," Kai answered.

"My counterpart?" Jellal asked, confused.

"Everyone in Edolas has an Earthland counterpart," Kai explained.

"Ah. I see," Jellal said.

"Okay, what else do you know about us?" Jellal interrogated.

Kai took a deep breath and started explaining, words forming a little faster than normal speech. "You are Prince Jellal Royales of Edolas. You have been disowned by your father, who is mad with power, and you came to this forest through a portal between Edolas and Earthland known as Anima, which siphons Magic from Earthland and brings it to Edolas to replenish their limited supply. You were injured and nearly killed, but you were saved by an Exceed known as Panther Lily, who was then exiled from Extalia for aiding a human and accepted into the Royal Army, where he is currently training like crazy to get stronger. I also know that Exceeds are feline creatures that can fly using a Magic known as Aera and the Magic they have in their bodies, which is restricted to Exceeds in Edolas, thus making them revered as angels. Queen Shagotte of the Exceeds is actually worse at Aera Magic than her fellow Exceeds (so she can't fly like the others) and she is not a queen by blood. However, she is still good-natured, as she will send many unborn Exceed eggs to Earthland, including her own daughter's egg, to save the Exceed race from your father's paranoid wrath. She also has the ability to see the future, which has been passed on to her daughter. Plus, I know of Erza Knightwalker, whose counterpart is also in my guild, as well as Coco, Sugarboy, Byro, and Hughes. By the way, did you know that Hughes's Earthland counterpart is a girl? It's kinda weird when you think about how he is a boy in Edolas and a girl in Earthland. Don't you agree?" He was panting by the end of his long list of facts.

"Ooh, ooh, what about me?" Wendy asked excitedly.

Kai took another deep breath. "Okay. I know less about you but..." he started, then he sped up, "You are an orphan who was taken in and taught Sky Dragon Slayer Magic by Grandine the Sky Dragon. She suddenly went missing today and you can't find her. I know of three other kids who are in the exact same situation as you right now, for they are also Dragon Slayers, taught by dragons just like you were, and they suddenly were unable to see their dragon foster parents today, plus a fourth kid who's dragon parent had to leave earlier (and that's my fault, actually). In fact, that fourth kid is in the same guild as me right now. Also, there is an old medic who is the Edolas version of Grandine and was given two Dragon Slayer Secret Arts Grandine didn't have a chance to teach you, which you will have to learn when you're stronger with your Magic. That medic is actually a member of my guild too, but she doesn't like humans, even though she is one, so she remains reclusive and lives in a hollowed-out tree in the forest. Am I missing anything? Oh, and it's also kind of my fault that you look 12 even though you're younger. You see, I accidentally aged your body forward a few years. You are only 7, right? Well, you look 12. Don't worry, you could still say to everyone that you're 7 since you've only been alive for 7 years." He took another deep breath.

"I... look 12?" Wendy asked, looking down and noticing that she was taller than she thought.

Jellal simply blinked two times next to Wendy, who also blinked twice. "Wow. You know a lot already, don't you? Either way, I don't want to make an enemy, so perhaps you and I could travel together?" he asked.

"Of course," Kai answered.

"Can... can I come too?" Wendy asked.

"Uh..." Jellal hesitated.

"Of course. And, if things get dangerous, I'll protect you. Both of you," Kai commented.

Jellal conceded, "Okay, you can come."

Wendy smiled. "Thank you!" she said gratefully.

"So, what now? Because I think it would be best if we went somewhere to set up a home that we can return to in our free time. I'm sure we can use my apartment," Kai suggested.

"That is a great idea, Kai. Where is your apartment?" Jellal asked.

Kai smiled and held out a hand to each of them. "Grab on. We'll get there in no time," he said confidently. The two of them obliged before the three people disappeared.

 **Magnolia, Kai's apartment...**

The three travelers appeared out of thin air, landing on their feet. The two newcomers looked around. "Wow. How did we get here so fast?" Jellal asked.

"I just used Direct Line Magic. Told you we'd get here in no time!" Kai joked.

"You weren't kidding..." Wendy breathed, amazed.

"Nope. Anyway, make yourselves at home. After all, this is our new base of operations, right?" Kai told them, prompting them all to put down their stuff and sit on the couch.

"This place is _huge_!" Wendy commented, jumping on a couch that was against the wall of the large room.

"So... now that we have a base of operations, what shall we do first? What do you two want to do?" Kai asked.

"Well, I need to go around closing Anima portals. That way, they will stop stealing Magic from Earthland," Jellal answered.

"Wendy, what about you?" she asked.

"Well, I don't know. I think I'll just go with you two and try to help anyway I can. I may not look strong, but I do know supportive Magic and Healing Magic," Wendy answered.

"I see. Then, we shall travel with Jellal. But I think that you should put on some sort of disguise," Kai noted.

"Why?" he asked.

"You don't want to risk your Earthland counterpart finding out about you, do you?" Kai asked rhetorically.

"Good point," Jellal noted, reaching into his bag and pulling out a black beanie and bandana and putting them on.

 **Over the next couple of days, Kai teleported them around during the day and they slept during the night in Magnolia. Most importantly, though, was that they usually lie awake at night to listen to Kai talk about Fairy Tail. Wendy was very excited that she could join a Mages' guild like Fairy Tail and Jellal, who shall now be referred to by his alias "Mystogan" (yeah, it was Kai's suggestion), was happy that Earthland's Fairy Tail were all good people (though he got the impression that the Edolas Fairy Tail were all bad people, he kept it to himself). At the end of that week, the two of them joined Fairy Tail. They learned that Natsu and Ultear already knew of them, with Natsu appearing to have a history with each of them, and got the short explanation from Kai about their being from the future. Amazed, they both took Dream Cards from Kai, who Ultear noted seemed to be giving them out to all of Natsu's friends. Though he joined Fairy Tail along with Wendy a few days later, Mystogan decided he shouldn't keep taking Wendy along with him, lest he ruin her childhood with boring trips of him closing Anima portals. She sort of understood, and Kai vowed to keep her safe while he was away. Of course, he was using his five Magic Staves, being naturally unable to utilize Magic, and, the day after joining Fairy Tail, he left on a job with a smile under his bandana.**

* * *

 **X778, a house in a rural town...**

"Monster!"

"Demon!"

"Get out of our town!"

"Die, evil demon!"

Right now, Elfman, Lisanna, and Mirajane Strauss were huddled together in a stranger's house. The nearby villagers were clearly pissed at them, but the confusing part was that Mirajane had saved their village and yet she was still being treated like a monster. It got to her. Even she believed that she probably wasn't human. Her siblings didn't, but she did. She was crying right now.

"I'm so sorry I dragged you two into this, Lisanna, Elfman," she cried.

"Nee-chan, it's not your fault! The demon stopped attacking them because of you, so they should be thanking you!" Lisanna tried to raise her morale. She got up and walked over to the window. She opened it, halting the villagers.

"Hey! What's the big idea?! Why are you attacking us?" she yelled. The villagers only resumed their onslaught, hitting Lisanna now that the window was open.

"It's okay. You don't have to protect me. I'm not even human anymore..." Mirajane spoke softly and forlornly.

"Don't say that, Mira-nee. We're going to protect you," Elfman assured her.

Suddenly, the rapid thudding noise they heard against the house stopped. The three of them ventured slowly to the window to see what was going on. They saw a big glowing circle in front of them. They gasped.

"What is that?" Elfman asked.

"It blocked their weapons," Mirajane noted.

"Look down there!" Lisanna said, pointing to the ground.

Mirajane did as her sister asked, and so did her brother. They noticed that there was a red-haired man standing there, holding out one hand in front of him.

"He's making the barrier!" Mirajane realized.

Meanwhile, the barrage of projectiles was still going on, trying (in vain) to bypass the barrier. This continued until the man shouted, "HEEEEY!"

He then proceeded to rant, thus speaking in an excessively angry tone. "What are all of you doing?" he asked.

"We're killing the demon!" a brave villager shouted, which everyone else affirmed with a resounding "YEAH!".

"Why? I don't see a demon killing anyone out here. So tell me, why are you attacking these innocent children and forcing them to take refuge in a complete stranger's home? You better take responsibility for scarring them!" he yelled. He sounded furious.

"That girl absorbed the demon! She's a demon! We must kill her!" the first brave villager shouted.

The man sighed loudly. "Okay, you people are all STUPID! Why won't any of you use your logic before you start scarring childhoods? Just think about it. Even if she was a demon, you attacking her doesn't help anything! And she's completely human, and she stopped the demon from killing all of you. Not to mention..."-and this is where his voice echoed-"...she's a MAGE, dammit! Even though she hasn't trained yet, she just absorbed the demon without even thinking, not to mention she has it perfectly under control, and she stopped it from exterminating all of you! So why are you trying to kill her with bottles and pitchforks and torches? So what if her arm looks like that of the demon? What would happen if you all made her hate you and vow to take revenge by killing all of you? What then, huh? Or what if you end up looking up to her later and she absolutely refuses to acknowledge you?" (okay, rant over).

This rant had silenced the villagers and made them drop their weapons (and put out the torches). Most of them did this and fell to their knees. Some of them, however, remained standing with pitchforks held high.

"Why should we listen to you? How do we know you're not some demon come to absorb her?" spoke that first brave villager.

"You, my friend, are the stupidest of everyone here. _That's_ why you should listen to me. Besides, like her, I' _m **a** **MAGE, dammit** **!**_ " he yelled, his voice gradually adding layers, as if he was speaking in unison with a demon or five, his body enveloped in a spherical frame of black-red lightning, which he then blew away, knocking out all the villagers, even that first brave one. He took a deep breath while the Strausses watched in shock. He jumped and landed on the windowsill, taking a seat.

"You're not hurt, are you?" he asked.

"N-No..." Lisanna replied, while the others only shook their heads.

"Good. Except that your head is bleeding. Let me heal that for you," he said, holding out a hand over the cut over her eye. His hand glowed green and the blood stopped flowing. "Close your eyes tight," he commanded. After she complied, he picked up a nearby towel, the towel becoming seriously wet in his hands, and wiped off the blood that had already trailed down her face.

Mirajane finally got over her fear and worked up the courage to ask him, "Who _are_ you?"

"My name is Kai. Don't be put off by the angry face I put on back there. It kind of made it easier to act like a raging psycho when something so messed-up like that was going on right in front of me," here he smiled, "I just wanted to protect some innocent kids."

"What happened to them? Are they all right?" Lisanna asked, pointing out the window.

"Yes. Just unconscious," Kai answered.

"Why are you here?" Mirajane asked.

"I figured I'd tell you about a Mages' guild called Fairy Tail. I think we can help you recover from your pain, not to mention teach you how to control that Magic of yours," he answered, directing that last part at Mirajane specifically.

"A Mages' guild? Why?" Elfman asked.

"What are your names?" Kai asked in response.

"I-I'm Lisanna," she answered.

"I am Mirajane Strauss," Mirajane answered.

"My name is... Elfman," he answered, apparently a little nervous of saying his name out loud to a complete stranger.

"Well, okay then, I'm glad I learned your names. Now, as for that explanation, here goes. Mirajane unintentionally used her latent Magic power to perform a Magic known as Take Over. It allows the caster to take the soul, abilities, and appearance of a living being, such as a demon or a bear or a cat, and use those abilities as their own. The soul then lives within the caster's body. I shall show you an example of Take Over Magic," Kai explained, before getting off the windowsill. He assumed a ready-to-dodge kind of stance.

" **Take Over: Zinogre.** " As soon as he called this out, he started to morph, his body being covered in orange squares for a second while the change happened. After the squares disappeared, however, he looked far different. While he still had red hair, it was sticking up and there was a golden horn protruding from the center and one from each side of his head. While he was still anthropomorphic, he was covered in electric blue scales and lines of golden spikes crossed his chest and over his shoulders, plus the same golden shell coating his feet and hands, making humanoid hands with thick fingers, black paw pads, and black claws. There were electric arcs haphazardly appearing all over his body. The siblings jumped back at this.

"Whoa! What is that thing?" Elfman asked, more in awe of it than frightened. His little sister, however, was still frightened by it and hid behind Mirajane and Elfman.

"This is a Zinogre. Like I said, Take Over allows you to steal the soul, appearance, and abilities of sentient, living beings. This is basically what a Zinogre looks like, only it is not anthropomorphic like I am. And, trust me, the Zinogre, even though it's a beast, is living within me. It has just lost control of its body. And, as you can see, a Zinogre is very... lightning-y. Watch." Kai, still in this form, picked up a nearby metal spoon. The handle was in his hand while the spooning end was sticking out. It only remained that way for a minute. After a minute, the spoon part fell off and Kai opened his hand to reveal a small puddle of molten metal dripping out from his hand. He shook his hand, the molten metal melting the ground a little and making smoke, which he snuffed out with his foot.

"Whoa... that is so... manly," Elfman commented, transfixed by the sight in front of him. His sisters looked too, with Lisanna building up the courage to not be scared by the beast in front of her.

"Electricity causes heat. Imagine how much power was coursing through that spoon before it melted, and be amazed," Kai commanded, transforming back into his human form.

"Amazing... and you said Mira-nee used that Magic on accident? Wow, nee-chan, you are awesome!" Lisanna said.

"It's a Magic? How do I get rid of it?" Mirajane asked.

"You already absorbed that demon. You can't get rid of it. Don't worry, though... you _can_ control it. That demon has already lost control of its own body either way, so it can't hurt anyone. And don't worry about becoming a demon yourself if you use this Magic. That only happens to people who aren't strong enough to Take Over whatever type of being that their Take Over Magic is for, and only when the being is being Taken Over. In your case, Mirajane, that would be demons. It's best for you to use Take Over on demons that are near-dead. You will both save their life and gain control of their power much easier that way. Plus, the demon will stop destroying stuff. Everyone wins," Kai explained.

"Really? Well... as long as I can stop it from hurting my family..." Mirajane sighed with relief.

"You know, switching topics now, you probably aren't welcome in this village anymore after me knocking them all out. Were you thinking of travelling?" Kai asked.

"Oh... well, we have no choice..." Mirajane realized.

"Well, then, I'm travelling with you. I have a big apartment in Magnolia, plus two roommates. Let's go," Kai stated.

"Why are you telling us this all of a sudden?" Mirajane asked cautiously.

"Because if you're going to learn how to control that Magic, you should probably have the support of a Mages' guild. Not only might they be able to help you by providing new perspectives on any problems you might face, but, at Fairy Tail, you will most certainly find a friend or two at least. Each of you. Besides, Magnolia only has one Mages' guild, and I think it's the perfect one," Kai explained.

"A Mages' guild?" Elfman asked.

"Yeah. Remember how I was talking about Fairy Tail? Something I've learned by being a member is that everyone is proud to bear their guild mark, like the one over my eye," Kai answered.

"Cool!" Lisanna cheered.

"Plus, there's someone there who'd probably like to meet you..." Kai hinted cryptically.

"Who?" Mirajane asked, curiosity overtaking caution.

"If I told you now, that might ruin the surprise," Kai answered her.

"Okay..." Mirajane said slowly.

"Anyway, let's go. If you choose to come with me, go get your things from your house and meet me by the door," Kai said, jumping down from the window.

"We should definitely go with him," Elfman stated.

"Mm-hmm!" Lisanna affirmed.

Mirajane wasn't speaking; rather, she was thinking. 'It's very suspicious. This guy suddenly comes out of nowhere and asks us to run away to his apartment. Sure, he stopped the villagers, but...' She was pulled out of her thoughts by Lisanna tugging on her sleeve.

"Mira-nee, let's go get our things!" she cheered. Her and Elfman were already running down the stairs after that comment.

"Hey, Lisanna, Elfman, wait!" Mirajane called after them, running to catch up.

 **An hour later, Kai's apartment...**

It was a rare chance for Wendy to be in the same room as Mystogan, but she was happy nonetheless. She walked in, with her blue pigtails hanging down to her forearms and her guild mark on her right arm, and she found Mystogan cooking. She sniffed the air, expressing approval at the pleasant smell. He turned and found her closing the door behind her, looking at him.

"Good afternoon, Wendy," he greeted, waving a hand.

"Hey, Mystogan," she greeted back.

"I'm making chicken soup," he informed her, looking into the pot and stirring.

"It smells good. Anyway, have you seen Kai?" she asked.

"No, I have not," he replied.

Suddenly, in the middle of the room appeared Kai and three white-haired kids. Wendy snapped her head forward in surprise and Mystogan focused on the group of four in the large apartment. Just saying, it looked so big that it could've been a house by itself if it had a hallway. Currently, though, the only walls inside the giant room were those surrounding the bedrooms.

"Oh, hey Kai. I've been looking for you," Wendy noted.

"Oh, you have?" Kai asked, while the three admired the huge apartment, having dropped their things on the floor in their astonishment.

"Yes." Wendy walked over to Mirajane and turned her head to face her. "Hi, I'm Wendy. What's your name?" she asked.

"Oh, Mirajane," she greeted.

"And what about you two?" Wendy asked, turning to the other two.

"Oh, it's Elfman," he greeted.

"I'm Lisanna," she greeted.

"Nice to meet you!" Wendy smiled, causing the two sisters to smile and Elfman to parrot her, grinning as he said that.

"Over there in the kitchen is Mystogan. He's pretty good at cooking. He's usually out, though, travelling around," Kai said, pointing to the kitchen.

"Oh, really? What does he do when he travels?" Lisanna asks.

"Mystogan, can I tell them about Anima?" Kai asked.

"I am fine with that," he answered.

"'Anima'?" Mirajane asked.

"It's a spell that siphons Magic energy from Earthland and transports it to Edolas, a world with a limited Magic supply. Mystogan goes around closing the Anima portals because he disagrees with the plan that opened the Anima portals in the first place," Kai explained.

"A world with a limited Magic supply?" Lisanna asked.

"Well, Magic is renewable here in Earthland," Kai explained quickly.

"I am actually from Edolas," Mystogan noted.

"Is Edolas another place?" Elfman asked.

"Another world," Mystogan answered.

"Really?" Elfman asked.

"Yes," he answered, before getting more ingredients out of the fridge.

"Hey, Mystogan, is that an Exceed egg?" Kai called, pointing to an egg near the center of the room.

"Yes. I found it last night in my travels and I recognized that it was an Exceed's. I figured the Exceed should be given a home, so I brought the egg here," Mystogan explained.

"Wait..." Kai realized something, putting his hand to his chin while examining the egg.

"Is something wrong, Kai?" Lisanna asked.

"No... I just suspected something... don't worry about it," Kai shrugged off her question.

"What's an Exceed?" Elfman asked.

"An Exceed is a feline creature that is born with its own Magic energy and a technique called Aera, which allows them to grow wings and fly. I think this particular egg is going to end up being a white-furred, brown-eyed, female Exceed, judging by the medical Scan I just did," Kai explained.

"You can tell all that just from an egg?" Lisanna asked, amazed.

"No. I performed a medical Scan. You see, in addition to training to be a Mage, I have also trained to be a doctor. Likewise, I learned a Magic known as Analysis. Together, and used properly, these skills can help me cure any curable sickness with medicine or treat any treatable wounds with bandages. Or, worse comes to worse, I could just use Healing Magic," Kai explained.

Wendy showed surprise by flinging her eyes wide and gasping lightly. "Wow, Kai. You know Healing Magic too?" she asked.

"'Healing Magic'?" Lisanna asked, tilting her head to the side in curiosity.

"Oh, I was taught Sky Dragon Slayer Magic by Grandeeney, the Sky Dragon. There's a lot of supportive spells, but the best ones are the healing ones in my opinion," Wendy explained.

"What? You didn't think you were Grandine's only student, did you?" Kai joked.

"You were her student? I had no idea she had another student," Wendy protested.

"That's because she taught me before the Dragon Civil War, which occurred about 400 years ago. After the war was over, I bid her farewell. I started travelling on my own and, along with the Dragon Slayer Magic I had picked up from a few other dragons, I... travelled to X777," Kai explained.

"So does that mean you're 400 years old?" Mirajane asked.

"...Technically, yes. However, you could argue that I am younger than that because I spent most of those 400 years travelling through time, where I did not age while travelling," Kai answered.

"So just how old are you?" Mirajane asked.

"I am about 36 years old now, not including the years I spent time-travelling," Kai answered.

"Ah. I see," Mirajane noted.

"I want to raise the egg!" Lisanna volunteered.

"You do?" Kai asked.

"Mm-hmm!" Lisanna affirmed.

"Okay, but perhaps you should have Wendy help you," Kai suggested.

"Huh? Why?" she asked.

"Because Wendy is a very gentle and caring person. Besides, for some reason, Exceeds in this world gravitate to Dragon Slayers. I have no idea why," Kai answered.

"Really?" Wendy asked.

"Yeah. Anyway, Mirajane, Lisanna, Elfman, let's go to Fairy Tail. Just so you could see the Mages' guild I told you about," Kai said.

"Huh? They're joining Fairy Tail?" Wendy asked.

"Well, at the very least, just Mirajane. She has hidden Magic power. She has already utilized a type of Magic called Take Over on accident. She just doesn't know how to use it yet, so I'm thinking it might be best if she has support. Of course, it's still her choice," Kai answered. Mirajane took her arm out of her cloak, revealing to Wendy the demonic arm she had acquired.

"Whoa! I-Is that the demon?" Wendy asked, stuttering shyly.

"Technically, that's only the demon's arm," Kai answered. Seeing Mirajane's sad glance out of the corner of his eye, he turned to her and said, "Don't take her reaction personally, Mirajane. She's just a bit shy."

"Um... Can I come with you to the guild hall?" Wendy asked.

"I don't see why not," Kai replied.

"Why don't we eat lunch first? I made enough for all of us," Mystogan suggested.

"Oh, yeah, let's do that," Kai replied, licking his lips.

"I'll be right there. I just have to put this egg on a cushion," Lisanna informed, looking around and finding a large cushion on the floor. Placing the egg gently on the cushion, she then joined the others at the dining table.

 **After the meal, in front of the Fairy Tail guild hall...**

Mirajane peeked inside the building, her siblings peeking in behind her, and took note of all the children there. She noticed a particular pink-haired boy and his friends first, gazing wistfully at them, before letting her eyes roam around to the other group of kids she noticed, who all seemed to be on a team, what with them having their guild marks in similar locations. She turned back to the first group. She saw the pink-head fighting with a black-haired boy, with a brown-haired girl, a blue-haired girl, a red-haired lady with an eyepatch, a black-haired girl a little older than her who was wearing waaaay too many layers of clothing, a blue-haired boy with his guild mark and another tattoo on his face, a half-naked silver-haired boy with his hair sticking up, and a half-naked 28-year-old standing by. Mirajane blushed at the fact that the lady and the silver-haired boy were half-naked in the middle of the guild hall and at the fact that a few people were staring (and they seemed to be perverted). What was worse was that they didn't even seem to notice until the brown-haired girl looked back at her with an annoyed expression on her face and said, "Ur, Lyon, Ultear, your clothes." After that, they freaked out and quickly put their respective clothes back on (or, in Ultear's case, took her non-respective clothes _off_ ). Mirajane backed away from the window to examine the front of the building.

"This place looks rowdy," she noted.

Wendy giggled nervously. "Yeah, that's mainly because of Natsu. He starts fights all the time and... well, the guild hall goes crazy," she explained.

"Natsu? Which person is he?" Mirajane asked, going back to the window.

"He's the pink-haired kid. He's really a nice person, and the atmosphere of the guild hall suits him quite well, don't you think?" Wendy asked.

Mirajane observed Natsu starting a fight with the rest of the guild hall without turning from his fight with the black-haired boy. "I can see that," she deadpanned. Suddenly, they jumped back when Natsu slammed into the window face-first, smearing the glass. He looked at her and pushed himself off the window, running out the door and standing in front of them.

"Oh, hey Mira-chan, Elfman, Lisanna!" he said.

"Huh? I don't think we've met before..." Mirajane said, taken aback.

"It's complicated, Mirajane, but the point is that he knows you three. But, Natsu, introduce yourself anyway," Kai answered.

"Oh. I'm Natsu Dragneel!" he informed them, smiling. Apparently, his smile was infectious, because everyone present smiled when he did. Then another kid burst through the door, the black-haired boy he was fighting earlier.

"Hey, where do you think you're going in the middle of a fight?" he glared at Natsu before noticing the three new faces as well as the three familiar ones. His glare subsided as he noticed them. "Oh, hey, Wendy. Hey, Mystogan. I had no idea you were in town," he noted.

"I just arrived this morning," he answered.

"Ah. And who are you three?" the black-haired boy asked them.

"I'm Elfman," he introduced.

"My name is Lisanna," she introduced.

"Mirajane," she introduced.

"Are you all siblings? Your hair is the same color," the new boy asked.

"Yes, we are," Mirajane answered calmly.

"What is your name?" Lisanna asked.

"I'm Gray Fullbuster," he answered. Turning his head to look at Kai, he noted, "I see that Kai is with you..." and here he turned his frontside to Kai, "Did you explain it yet?"

"Explain what?" Lisanna asked.

"I will explain that later," Kai announced.

"Ah, I see. Now, Flame-Brain, where were we?" Gray taunted.

"Come and get me!" Natsu taunted. They ran inside, where Gray followed him. The group looked through the window to see that Natsu and Gray got ganged up on and were sent flying in different directions through the guild hall's walls. They sweat-dropped.

"Whatever happened to their fight?" Mirajane asked rhetorically.

"I guess those guys broke them up," Kai noted.

 **After that, the group went inside, where Kai introduced the Master to the Strausses. Mirajane agreed to join, while Elfman and Lisanna wanted to join so they could be with their sister, even agreeing to learn a Magic. Naturally, they said, "Take Over Magic," since their sister was learning it. The weird thing about it, though, was that they rather liked Take Over Magic. Elfman went with the Beast Soul variant because Kai had showed him a Take Over of a beast and thought it rather cool (or "manly", as he put it), while Lisanna chose the Animal Soul kind because she really liked animals (plus, she was really looking forward to raising that Exceed egg at the apartment). Mirajane learned that her type of Take Over was called Satan Soul and, surprisingly, didn't react very much to hearing the name. Meanwhile, once they had finished discussing that, Natsu rushed into the guild hall with a giant egg similar to the egg that was resting on a cushion in Kai's apartment. Lisanna and Mirajane noted that, but Kai told them it was not the same egg, only the same species. After some advice from the Master, Lisanna agreed to raise the egg with Natsu as well (eagerly, I might add). Natsu revealed that he was living in Kai's huge apartment as well, along with Ultear, Ur, Lyon, Gray, Erza, and Jellal. Naturally, this cleared up the reason for him having so many bedrooms (there was even an upper level above their heads!). The more important part, though, was that he basically integrated the Strausses into the small roommate-group he was forming in his apartment. Not to mention, that group grew on the day when Wendy, Natsu, and Lisanna brought their Exceed children into the guild and, on the spot, Natsu decided to name them Happy and Happier (Wendy sweat-dropped at that and decided to go with Carla, a much more normal name). Everyone was so happy, they partied (well, not Natsu, Wendy, and Lisanna. They had kids to raise, after all). Plus, that night, the Strausses were introduced to the Dream Forest for the first time, filled in on the whole 'time-travel' business, and met by all the other residents of the huge room/apartment (in reverse order).**

* * *

 **Time had passed since that day. The kids grew to be teens, the adults matured, and the old only became older. Natsu had developed quite the friendly relationship with his friends. Sadly for him, he knew nothing about romance, as evidenced when Lisanna almost kissed him and he treated it as something new (which, to be honest, is not the worst reaction one could receive) as opposed to accepting her feelings and by when Cana vaguely alluded to her feelings for him while drunk and he didn't pick up any hints from her drunken "I wouldn't mind sleeping with Natsu," during girl talk with her female friends (of course, the subject was on Natsu when Natsu walked by and Cana wouldn't shut her mouth). Not to mention, the members of the Natsu group and the Seis group (who, at Ultear's urging, started sitting with Natsu's group) went on missions and, whether by their actions or their presence, drew even more members to Fairy Tail. Simon found Kagura travelling on her own and had a happy reunion with his sister, Ultear saved Meredy from being killed at the hands of Zancrow (who wasn't apparently in Grimoire Heart this time around) and took her in, Sorano found her sister Yukino Agria in her travels, Natsu summoned Loke at one point and drew the attention of Karen Lilica, and Lyon went on a mission and came back with Sherry Blendy around his arm and an annoyed expression on his face. Not to mention the fact that, not a minute later, Wendy went on a walk and came back while talking with the excessively-smart Chelia Blendy. Then the two cousins met everyone and decided to join upon revealing that they were also Mages. Not to mention, a certain blond Celestial Spirit Mage ran away when her father punished her for "bothering him" and her mother tried to catch up to her. Now, we say farewell to history in favor of moving on to when the story all began that day in Hargeon Town (and, no, not _this_ story. I mean the original.). First, though, the day before that day, since it's important...**

* * *

 **X784, Fairy Tail...**

"Huh? 'Salamander' is in Hargeon? Where's that?" Natsu asked. He was now physically mature, and he was still getting used to not looking 17 (or, as he knew it, 'how he used to look'). His being taller sometimes threw him for a loop at the worst of times, sometimes he forgot he was stronger than back then, and, to top it all off, sometimes his roommates looked at him funny. He really couldn't tell what the problem was, but he eventually just learned to wave goodbye and walk away when that happened. Currently, he was sitting at the bar of Fairy Tail's guild hall, talking to a now grown-up Happy and Carla, with Mirajane and Cana, the former of whom was leaning on the counter and the latter of whom sitting next to him at the bar, having just finished chugging her booze barrel and using the now-empty container as a footrest behind Natsu, putting her elbow on the bar. Mirajane was now a mature woman as well as Cana, with Cana wearing a bikini top and capri pants along with her bag, while Mirajane was wearing a formal dress with her bangs tied up.

"Aye. I heard it while I was flying to the fish market. It could be Igneel," Happy answered. He was wearing nothing but his bag, just as Natsu always knew him.

"'Salamander'? Isn't that you?" Cana asked.

"Huh? Is it? I didn't quite get that the first time around either," Natsu asked blankly, putting his hand on his chin.

"Of course it is. That's your nickname," Mirajane commented.

"Awesome! I have a nickname!" he cheered. The others sweat-dropped.

"Uh... you know, _Sorcerer Weekly_ calls you that in pretty much every issue. I would've thought you would've caught on right about now," Carla deadpanned.

"Oh, give him a break, Carla. That's just how he is," Cana reprimanded her.

"I know, I know," Carla said dismissively, smirking.

"Oh yeah! I remember now! That's where I first met Lucy!" Natsu said excitedly.

"Really? You met her in Hargeon?" Mirajane asked.

"Yeah. There was this jerk who used Fire Magic and hurt Lucy, plus some other people. I really don't like him," Natsu answered.

"Oh, who are we talking about?" asked Yuki, who sat next to Natsu.

"That guy in Hargeon who said he was from Fairy Tail. The one who took my name," Natsu answered.

"Who took your name?" asked another passing figure. It was Jellal, actually (heh, I bet you thought he was only good friends with girls, huh? Well, I'm going to change that... Of course, he's still straight. I don't know how to write gay relationships all that well and I would probably screw them up completely). Jellal was wearing white leather armor and his emblem as one of the Ten Wizard Saints on his shoulder.

"Oh, this guy who kidnapped a bunch of people while I was in Hargeon the first time around. Luckily, he was no match for me!" Natsu boasted confidently.

"Aren't you mad that he keeps saying he's you?" Cana asked.

"Oh, definitely. I think I'm going to go beat him up right now!" Natsu said angrily, cracking his knuckles. He jumped from his seat, landing next to Gray by the door, and ran towards Magnolia, shouting behind him "Come on, Happy!". Gray followed the pair out the door, shouting at Natsu to "Get back here, matchstick!". Once he was gone, Ultear came up to the little group with Ur, Lyon, Levy, and a smiling young Meredy behind her.

"Where's he going?" she asked.

"Hargeon," they all responded blankly, still staring after him out the door.

"Why?" Ur asked.

"He's going to beat up someone who took his name," Carla deadpanned.

"Wait... If I remember correctly, this is when he meets Lucy and nearly-okay, I have to follow him," Ultear noted decisively, running out the door.

The group just watched them leave until Wendy and Elfman, and came up to the group and looked out the door. "Um... what are we staring at?" Wendy asked nervously.

"Nothing much, child. Natsu-san was just being himself," she commented.

Cana chuckled before getting up to follow. "He's probably going to get arrested if more of us don't come along with him," she commented.

"What about Ultear?" Ur asked, semi-defensive that her daughter wasn't mentioned.

"She probably went to repair the damage Natsu's going to cause. You know how destructive he is," she commented.

"How's she going to repair the damage by herself?" Lyon asked blankly.

Cana hesitated for a moment, something the others (well, most of the others) noted, before saying, "Beats me. Well, I'm going to go to Hargeon too. It'll be nice to meet little Lucy all grown up," while smirking.

"Ooh, I would like to come too!" Wendy commented, which most of them affirmed in their own way.

Cana smiled a smile of genuine happiness and not just of jest. "Be my guest."

::::::::::::::::::::::

Well, I am glad I got this over with. I have been wanting to write in the new storyline for a while and I'm glad I got the history of how all of Lucy's friends joined Fairy Tail. Naturally, on certain parts I try to remain vague because you never know how your story might develop. Still, sorry if certain parts didn't make much sense. I just wanted to write the next part of the story really badly. I'll see if I can make the next chapter after Lucy joins Fairy Tail shine some light on how these characters can possibly be the way Natsu remembers them despite living different lives. Anyway, now for the ages of all the characters of the story in the year X784:

Natsu (physically): 21

Ultear (physically): 22

Lucy: 16

Cana: 20

Levy: 19

Erza: 21

Jellal: 21

Ur: 36

Gray: 20

Lyon: 21

Laxus: 25

Freed: 22

Makarov: still old

Macao: old

Wakaba: old

Layla (physically): 29

Wendy (physically): 20

Mystogan: 21 (of course)

Mirajane: 21

Elfman: 20

Lisanna: 19

Kagura: 16

Meredy: 16

Yukino: 11

Karen Lilica: 21

Sherry: 17

Chelia: 15

Also, please don't forget to vote in my poll. I would really like more opinions since I only have 2 unique voters, so... please do vote.

And that's all I have right now. Bye!


	7. Ch 6: Meeting in Whore Gin(?)

Yo! I should probably explain something since I got questions in the reviews.

 **Natsu473 asked:** "Wouldn't Ur have to give birth to Ultear at age 14"?

 **My answer:** Not necessarily... (hint, hint)

Also, if you have a question involving the story's content (like Natsu473 above), feel free to ask in a review.

Disclaimer: I don't own Fairy Tail.

::::::::::::::::::::::

"Jeez. He only took 1000 Jewel off the price. Is my sex appeal really only worth that much?"

Currently, the one grousing was Lucy Heartfillia. Of course, those of you who saw the first episode will recognize this moment, but those that didn't... well, you probably should go do that. Either way, she was now walking through the city with a few thousand Jewel, which wasn't much for a travelling Mage, so she might as well have been broke.

Now, however, she noticed that many of the girls around her were running towards one end of the street she was on and flocking around what appeared to be a person. They were all screaming fangirl-ish screams of "Salamander-sama!" and the like. Lucy, remembering that 'Salamander' was the nickname of a Fairy Tail Mage, walked over there to see for herself what was going on. When she got to the crowd, she squeezed her way through to the middle and saw what everyone was looking at. The minute she saw him, her heart beat faster and she was entranced by him to the point where she was just staring at him, starstruck like nobody special. She apparently didn't know what to expect when she saw the Mage in the center of the crowd (though, to her credit, she only had hearsay to go on when the name 'Salamander' came to mind), but she never expected to be entranced by him like all the other fangirls surrounding him. She just stood there, staring on quietly.

Suddenly, however, the circle was breached by a different (pink haired, who else?) person pushing through the crowd. This newcomer was a guy, though, and certainly not a fan. He glared at the guy in the middle of the crowd and growled in anger. The first guy noticed him and smiled.

"Oh? What's this? A fan? Have you come for my autograph, young man?" he asked, still smiling and putting on the charm.

"Like hell! You took my name! I'm here to fight you!" he shouted before being immediately-afterwards tackled by a bunch of fangirls scorned (and hell hath no greater fury). They were berating him with the phrase "How dare you disrespect a great Mage!" in much less friendly terms, trying to poke his eye out among giving him other injuries (some of which were "below the belt", as it were) while the "great mage" they were talking about just stood there and chuckled to himself. Only one girl simply stood there instead of beating up the pink-haired newcomer, her mind no longer hazy. Lucy ran up to the cluster of angry teenagers and pulled him out from the big beating he was receiving with urgency, before running from the fangirls, dragging him by the arm. They ran around the city for about five minutes before looping back to the "Salamander" faker and they lost the fangirls after that. Needless to say, they simply made the angry teenagers focus on the fake and used that to escape, running around a corner and finding a restaurant.

Panting, she tapped the pink-haired guy on the shoulder. "Thank you. I'm going to treat you to lunch for saving me from that scumbag," she informed him, smiling kindly. Her smile broke for a minute, though, as she noticed something familiar about him.

"Ooh, really? Thank you so much, Lucy!" he looked up, smiling back at her.

Lucy blushed lightly and gasped. "N...Natsu?! Is that you?" she asked.

"Yeah. Who else would I be?" he asked.

"Well, it's just that I haven't seen you for, like, 10 years because I dropped my Dream Card somewhere and I haven't heard anything about what happened to you afterwards, so I'm a bit surprised to find you looking so... grown-up..." she explained, blushing lightly.

"Ooohhh, so that explains why you suddenly stopped using the Dream Card," Natsu noted.

"Natsuuuu!" came a high-pitched shout from behind Natsu. He turned around and found Happy flying to catch up to him.

"Gah! Natsu, do you see a flying cat?" Lucy exclaimed, surprised.

"Yeah. You haven't met Happy yet, have you?" he answered.

"His name is Happy?" Lucy asked.

"Aye! Nice to meet you, lady! What's your name?" asked the blue feline, flying up to Lucy.

"Gah! It talks?" she asked.

"Hey! I'm not an 'it'! I'm Happy!" he exclaimed indignantly.

"What are you happy about?" Lucy asked blankly.

"Well, on my way here, I found this really high-quality fish market and got myself this-no, wait, Happy is my _name_!" he answered.

"Oh," Lucy said blankly. "You know what, why don't we talk inside? I'll treat both of you to lunch," she suggested.

Happy gasped in positive disbelief. "Really?" he asked, smiling.

"Sure. I have enough money," she answered.

"Natsu!" Lucy heard a different voice coming from behind her and turned to see a large group of people running towards them, one of whom wearing too many clothes, two of whom wearing nothing but undergarments, and one of whom being another flying cat like Happy. She almost didn't notice the fact that one of them was wearing a bikini top instead of a shirt.

"Gah! Natsu, are they your friends?" she asked him surprised.

"Yes, we are," said the scantily-clad woman.

"Ur, Lyon, your clothes," said the bikini-top-clad woman. Looking down, they noticed and sighed in exasperation.

"Not again!" the nearly-naked silver-haired boy whined.

"We really need to learn how to control that weird habit," said the scantily-clad woman.

"Here are your clothes," said the black-haired woman who was wearing too many clothes before. She (now appropriately clothed) was handing them their clothes while they put the clothes on quickly.

"So, Lucy, you don't recognize us?" asked the blue-haired man, stepping forward.

"What do you- wait... Jellal? Is that you?" asked Lucy.

"Yes, it's me. How've you been, Lucy?" he asked, smiling.

"I've been doing well... er, mostly. Wait, does that mean..." -here she looked at the bikini-clad woman- "Cana? Is that you?" she asked incredulously.

"Yep. Long time no see, Lucy-chan. Surprised, aren't you?" Cana teased smoothly, smiling.

"You look so different! And... " -here she sniffed the air- "Have you been drinking?" she asked.

"Oh, yeah. I love to drink now," Cana commented, smiling sultrily. Lucy sweat-dropped.

"Oooooookay," she commented nervously. She then turned her attention to another blue-haired person who was standing next to Cana. "Oh, you must be Levy!"

"Yep! Glad you remember me, Lu-chan!" she exclaimed.

"Wait, you all know her?" asked the spiky-and-white-haired man.

"Yeah. We go way back," Ultear commented.

"Ultear-nee-chan!" Lucy exclaimed, smiling even wider, if that was possible.

"See?" Ultear asked rhetorically, hugging Lucy.

"So, where's Erza?" Lucy asked.

"Out on a job since two days ago. Don't worry, she's strong. She'll be back for sure," Jellal told her, smiling proudly.

"Really? I can't wait to see her! I wonder how strong she's gotten..." Lucy smiled excitedly.

"It appears we have a lot to talk about inside," said the white-furred cat.

"Oh... I don't think I have enough money to pay for everyone..." Lucy noted disappointedly.

"How sweet you are, Lucy..." came a female voice from behind her.

"...but you don't need to worry about that. We'll pay for everyone," came a male voice from behind her.

Lucy recognized the voices instantly. Turning, she saw who she expected: Yuki and Kai.

"Yuki! Kai! You're here too! And... you haven't changed at all over 10 years," she greeted, commenting that last part in confusion.

Yuki giggled. "Why, thank you," she commented.

"We don't get that often," Kai commented, smiling.

"By the way, there's someone who wants to see you," Yuki informed her, stepping aside and revealing another blond woman, whom Lucy recognized instantly and reacted out of uncertain feelings (she didn't know whether to worry or to rejoice more).

"Mom! Why are you here?" she asked.

"Oh, relax, Lucy. I just wanted to see my daughter again. I also wanted to meet the five orphans, but..." Layla commented (and you can imagine she was smiling, even as she hesitated). She was wearing different clothing from usual, however; instead of a fancy dress, she was wearing a long red skirt and a black jacket over a red blouse.

"Huh? 'The five orphans'? What do you mean?" Lucy asked.

"Oh, it's nothing important. The point is that I'm here now," Layla dismissed her question.

"I think we should all get a table inside. That'll give you both a chance to meet... well, the people you don't know, obviously," Kai commented.

"Ah, right," Layla commented. Standing next to her daughter, she walked inside alongside her, everyone else following.

* * *

Once inside, the group picked out a large round table to sit at. Setting their stuff down, they sat themselves on the chairs, the adults (except Natsu, who was too excited about eating to help them) pulling out the chairs of the younger ones while the two Exceeds (and I call them Exceeds because most of the people at the table knew of them) alighted on the table, standing next to their Dragon Slayer partners. Once they finished sitting down, a waitress came by and took their order (before they had initiated a conversation). The conversation obviously started after they ordered food.

"So, does everyone want to introduce themselves? I know who my daughter is, and I know that he is Kai, but what about the rest of you?" Layla asked. The members of the table went around in turn and did just that.

"I'm Cana," said lady answered, reclining against the back of the chair.

"My name is Wendy Marvell. Nice to meet you," said girl greeted, smiling shyly.

"I suppose I should introduce myself after my partner. My name is Carla," the milky feline answered, crossing her arms and speaking without any expression on her face and giving the impression of a mature and annoyingly stuck-up princess in her tone.

"I'm Natsu Dragneel," Natsu introduced, raising a hand for a second.

"Aye! And I'm Happy!" the blue Exceed smiled, raising his paws.

"My name is Levy McGarden," Levy smiled, raising her hand for a second.

"My name is Jellal Fernandes. Nice to meet you, Mrs. Heartfilia," Jellal answered.

"My name is Mirajane Strauss," she greeted, smiling sweetly.

"I'm Elfman. And I'm a MAN!" he shouted, causing Layla and Lucy to sweat-drop.

"I'm Yuki. Kai is my brother," she answered, smiling.

"I'm Gray. Gray Fullbuster," he introduced before trying to take off his shirt (and, since they've seen that multiple times, they just ignored him).

"My name is Ur. Nice to meet you," she introduced, sitting on her hands (apparently, she was trying a strategy of preventing her hands from moving. It seemed very effective in stopping a stripping habit).

"I'm Lyon. I'm an Ice-Make Mage!" Lyon boasted proudly, wearing a huge grin.

"I am Ultear. Ur's my mom," said lady introduced.

"Gray, Lyon, your clothes," Cana notified them, causing a quick exchange of chaos. Lucy was blushing profusely at seeing two half-naked guys struggling to put on pants while sitting down.

"Uh... what just happened?" Lucy asked.

"Oh, they have a weird habit to take off their clothes. Don't worry, it's usually more comical than embarrassing... for us," Yuki explained with a glint in her eye.

"I told you to sit on your hands, boys!" Ur scolded. She didn't even bother to look down until she noticed that Lucy was now the color of red wine, that even Layla was blushing a little in surprise, and that most of the restaurant was staring at her now. Frantically, she scrambled to grab her shirt from Ultear and put it on.

"You were saying, Ur?" Lyon teased, grinning and sitting on his hands.

Layla cleared her throat, prompting the restaurant to return to their own conversations. "A-Anyway, my name is Layla Heartfilia, and this is my daughter, Lucy," she introduced.

"Wow, you look very young, Mrs. Heartfilia. What's your secret?" Ur complimented.

"Actually, yeah, how _do_ you look that young, Mom? I thought you would look older after 13 years..." Lucy asked curiously. Cana, Carla, and Ultear turned their gaze to Kai, with Wendy and Jellal following suit. Eventually, only Lucy wasn't staring at Kai, who was looking back at them knowingly. Lucy was looking around at the table, confused.

"Kai, did you-" Ultear started.

"Yes, I did," he bluntly interrupted her.

Cana broke out in laughter after a moment. "Oh, man, not again!" she said jokingly, chuckling for a second.

"Why? What are you guys talking about?" Lucy asked innocently.

"Apparently, Kai is somehow responsible for your mother looking really young for her age," Mirajane said knowingly, smirking.

"What?" Lucy asked incredulously.

"That is true. However, I do not wish to share the tale here," Layla warned.

"And even if I wanted to share the story against her will, I wouldn't do it here," Kai informed them.

Wendy sighed. "Looks like Kai-san has done it again," she commented.

"'Again'?" Layla asked curiously.

"I guess I will explain some things once we get back to the guild," Kai said.

"Oh yeah, you told me you guys joined a guild. What guild was it?" Lucy asked.

"Fairy Tail. I'm surprised you didn't notice the mark anywhere. I mean, it's on Jellal's _face_ ," Kai remarked.

Lucy became extremely surprised. "F-Fairy Tail? Really?" she asked incredulously.

"Yeah. It's a very fun place," Mirajane commented.

"No way! I _love_ Fairy Tail! You're always causing a ruckus and it's hilarious! I've been wondering how to join for a while now," Lucy cheered.

"We should take you to see the Master, then. He'll probably let you join," Ultear commented.

Lucy gasped. "Really?" she asked eagerly.

"Yeah. That's how it went last time," Natsu commented. This got Layla and Lucy blinking twice.

"Uh... 'last time'?" Layla asked.

"Natsu and I are from the future," Ultear explained.

Now Layla cocked an eyebrow. "Really?" she asked skeptically.

"Yeah. I remembered this is the town where he originally met Lucy, though I wasn't so sure until he said he would come to this town to beat up a faker that took his nickname," Ultear explained further.

"Really? Did you find him yet?" Lucy asked.

"Yeah. You were there, remember?" Natsu commented.

She blinked. "Wait, that guy was a faker? Wow. I thought he was the real Salamander... Wait again, that means..." she commented.

"Yep. Natsu is Salamander," Cana affirmed.

"He was using some kind of illegal Magic," Natsu remembered.

"Yeah, he was. It's called 'Charm'. It was outlawed a few years ago," Lucy answered.

"Right. And there was something else I was forgetting..." Natsu finished, putting his hand on his chin.

"Anyway, are you a Mage, Lucy?" Mirajane asked.

"Oh, yeah. I use Celestial Spirit Magic," Lucy answered, facing her.

"Really? Which Spirits are you contracted to?" Wendy asked.

"Aquarius, Cancer, Taurus, and Virgo, along with-"

"Wait, you made a contract with the Maiden and the Golden Bull?" Layla asked.

"Mm-hmm. She came to me on my 8th birthday and made a contract, and I found Taurus' key in a field and made a contract with him there. I also have a few silver keys," Lucy commented.

"You know about contracts, Wendy?" Layla asked.

"Most of us know, actually," Wendy corrected, which most everyone affirmed.

"Natsu and I have made a few," Ultear answered.

"Oh, really? Well, that is just delightful! Which keys do you have?" Layla asked.

"Huh? We don't have any keys," Natsu answered, confused and confusing Layla.

"P-Pardon?" she asked.

Before Lucy or anyone else could explain, a waiter came by and kicked them out for public indecency (even though only Ur, Gray, and Lyon were naked), handing them their food in a bag. Then the group rushed out before they paid, which nobody noticed until nighttime. Currently, the group decided to just walk around the town, which they did until that night, when they ended their sightseeing trip by staring out at the sea from the road, getting a scenic view of everything, including...

"Look! It's Salamander-sama's party boat!" one nearby girl swooned.

"Man, I wish I was invited," her friend complained. Ultear turned to them.

"No, you don't," she told them. The group of three random girls looked at her.

"Excuse me? Who are you?" the third one asked.

"That Salamander was a faker. He was using an illegal Magic to get girls to like him, too. I wouldn't want to hang around that scumbag ever," she explained.

"What?" the first girl exclaimed.

"Oh! I just remembered what I was forgetting earlier!" Natsu exclaimed, drawing Ultear's attention.

"What is it, Natsu?" she asked.

"That faker was kidnapping a bunch of girls for some reason on that ship. I think he said something about new slaves... Lucy was one of them last time," he explained.

"WHAT?!" most of the group, including the three girls, exclaimed.

"Natsu, why couldn't you remember this sooner?" Ultear said, worried.

"I don't know," Natsu shrugged. "Why?"

"Because that guy was using your name and Charm Magic to take a bunch of girls to that ship, plus he had a Sleep Magic Ring too. At least what he was doing illegally never caught on to the public. Everyone knows that it's not fun to be kidnapped," she explained.

"We have to go save those innocent girls before they become women unwillingly!" Cana asserted, causing many to blush at that comment.

"Uh... how do you know that would happen?" Jellal deadpanned.

"I just do. Come on, let's go!" she commented, unfazed, running down the road towards the coast. Everyone decided to follow her except for Natsu, Wendy, Happy, and Carla, the latter two opting to fly the former two to the ship.

As the group went away, the three normal girls there were surprised more than anything. One of them turned to her friends. "So, let's just go to my place. We can get a good view of those people kicking that scumbag's ass," she told them.

"Huh? Why?" one of her friends asked blankly.

"Didn't you notice the guild mark they had? They were the real Fairy Tail. And Fairy Tail is freakishly strong from what I've heard, plus a lot of them specialize in Lost Magic. It's got to be exciting," she commented.

"Ah. Well, count me in!" her friends told her, smiling.

* * *

Natsu was currently in the sky, flying towards the 'party' ship (of course, those of you who watched the first episode, you might remember its corresponding canon moment. If you watched the first episode after I told you to, thank you for setting up some exposition for yourself. If you have yet to watch the first episode... you should probably go do that. If you just search it up, you'll find sites streaming it...) when he suddenly gasped.

"Happy, Carla, put me down," he told them.

"Huh? Why?" Carla asked.

"Do you not want to get on the boat, Natsu? Man, your motion sickness just makes everything inconvenient, doesn't it?" Happy asked.

"Natsu is motion sick?" Carla asked.

"Yeah. Kai told me it was a Dragon-Slayer thing. Whenever Natsu just so much as thinks of a vehicle, he gets really nauseous," Happy explained.

Suddenly, Happy freaked out when Natsu pointed his freaky puffed-up expression at him, dropping him headfirst. It didn't help that he was holding oily, fresh fish for most of the day. The group stopped moving and just stared blankly downward as he fell towards the beach, flinching when he landed with his head stuck in the sand, then Carla and Wendy sweat-dropping when came up with sand in his mouth and panicked frantically trying to remove it, even going so far as to nearly burn his feet off by blasting fire from his mouth. "Overreacting a little, aren't we?" Carla deadpanned.

"Natsu!" Happy shouted, diving towards his friend. By the time Happy reached Natsu, he had just regained his awareness and was, needless to say, alarmed when his friend tackled him right when he regained his awareness. Hearing the two groan in pain made more sweat-drops appear on the back of her head. Slowly, the two females descended to the beach, finally alighting on the sand gently. The 'party' boat was visible in the distance. As they landed, the rest of the group came up to them. Well, most of them.

"Natsu, Lucy was kidnapped by slavers! They went towards that ship! What are we going to do?" Jellal informed him with urgency.

Natsu sighed. "Aw man. That happened last time too..." he complained.

"What? You let my daughter get kidnapped by those jerks?" Layla growled.

"To be fair, this time it was Gray's fault," Ultear noted.

"Don't go blaming this on me! Lyon started it!" Gray protested childishly.

"Started what?" Lyon asked blankly, taking off his shirt in the process.

"Gray, don't be such a kid. Lyon, your shirt," Cana commanded. Lyon put his shirt back on, apparently relieved at the fact that it was only his shirt that time.

"Natsu, what were you going to do? I thought you four were flying to the ship," Mirajane asked.

"I got an idea," Natsu stated simply.

" _You_ had an idea? Okay, step back everyone. Natsu's going to do something stupid and destroy the beach," Gray mocked. He waited for a reaction.

All he got was a grin and a "How'd you guess?"

"Huh?" Gray asked.

Natsu simply took off his sandals and ran into the water, going knee deep. Watching in confusion, some of the group portrayed their confusion on their faces. Natsu took a deep breath and then a stance. His guild mark glowed gold and one of the tattoos on his abs lit up an ocean blue.

" **Open, Gate of the Water Bearer: Aquarius!** " he called.

"What?" called the ones who knew Natsu and Lucy but not long enough to know how Natsu could do this (so, basically, Wendy, Happy, Carla, Mirajane, Elfman, Layla, Ur, and Lyon; Gray didn't seem to care).

Sure enough, in front of Natsu, facing the group, appeared the mermaid with vibrant light blue hair, a sapphire decorating her forehead, an urn in her hands, earrings hanging from her earlobes, and a tattoo decorating her collarbone, the symbol of Aquarius.

"A-Aquarius? How is this possible?" Layla asked in amazement.

"Long time no see, Lady Layla. What do you want, Natsu?" she greeted, neither of those phrases sounding rude at all (at the most, the second one sounded a little impatient).

"I need you to wash that ship onto the shore," Natsu said, pointing to the ship in the water.

"Why?" Aquarius asked impatiently.

"Lucy is on that ship, you know..." Ultear enticed.

"Good enough for me," she smiled. She waved her urn and summoned a big wave that pushed the ship towards the shore.

...

"We're going to wash ashore!" yelled one of the crew.

"I know that! What caused it?" asked the 'Salamander' fake, who had just tied up Lucy (and hadn't gagged her yet).

"A giant wave!" he reported.

"What? A storm, perhaps... But it's a perfectly clear night!" 'Salamander' argued.

"I don't know how it happened either, Captain-san," the grunt replied.

"Brace for impact!" yelled another crewmember. Every one of the fake Salamander's crewmates did so, leaving the tied-up women on the ground and grabbing on to the siding on the walls of the room.

Meanwhile, the only ungagged woman in the room was not using her mouth to talk anyway. She was lost in her shock, then in her thoughts.

'I sense... Aquarius? ...It must have been Natsu. He told us that one time about how he and Ultear could summon Celestial Spirits. He came to save me...' she reasoned, smiling even as her head was knocked through the wall upon impact and she landed on the beach outside, unconscious.

...

Meanwhile, 'Salamander' had jumped out of the ship's cabin and flown to the overturned side of the ship with his Magic. He looked around and got a good look of the gathering crowd and the sand for about five seconds. Then he felt a punch to the gut and a kick to the butt (hey, I'm a poet and I didn't know it), where he got an even closer view of the sand as his head got stuck in the coast of Hargeon. Natsu jumped down to his buried body, grabbed his hand, the one with the rings, and crushed it, a fire so intense forming on his hand that it melted the rings, making them explode, the smoke of one a lovely pink and that of the other a sickly green. This action made the faker scream in agony, his head popping up out of the sand.

"Bora-san!" one of his crewmates yelled.

Happy did his thoughtful face for a minute. "That must be Bora the Prominence. He was kicked out of the Titan Nose guild and became known for using illegal Magic," he summarized.

"How vulgar," Carla commented with disgust.

Natsu pulled Bora's face up to his via pulling his hair. He growled, "I _really_ hate people like you... You took my name just to get a crowd, you took these vulnerable girls and tied them up when they thought they were going to be having a party... and you were going to sell them into slavery! I hate that the most!"

Bora gasped lightly (due to agony and not sarcasm). "H-How did you know that?" he asked weakly.

Natsu didn't reply verbally; instead, he picked Bora up off the ground (still, by his hair) and threw him at the overturned ship deck, leaving a dent in the ship and leaving Bora to nurse his lumpy head.

"N-Natsu?" came a frail yet familiar voice from behind him. I should probably explain really quickly that the Sleep Magic and the Charm Magic were destroyed, therefore all the girls came back to their senses and some had already crawled through the hole made by Lucy. They were currently on the opposite side of Natsu as his friends.

"Lucy!" he remembered. Natsu turned away, walking towards the tied up girls. Bora chuckled evilly.

"Oh no you don't! **Hell Prominence!** " Bora called out, hitting Natsu square in the back with a thick red whip of fire. It exploded on contact and cloaked the body in flames. The crowd gasped at this (though his friends didn't react at all). All was silent for a second, save for the crackling of the fire. Bora stood up. "I can't believe I let my guard down against some lowlife faker like you. I must be getting rusty," he criticized himself arrogantly and loudly.

Not a moment after he finished that sentence, through the fire came a "Tch." Everyone gasped again, because everyone heard it, though his friends merely smiled.

"Huh?" Bora gaped.

Through the fire came a familiar voice which even the now-large crowd recognized as Natsu's. "Not this crap again. Just the _smell_ of this fire is making me sick," he complained teasingly. Everyone saw his silhouette inhale loudly and saw the flames flowing into his mouth. Once all the flames vanished, the crowd saw a perfectly undamaged Natsu (except for the fact that he was wearing only a scarf; fire and clothes don't mix, after all) standing there, his Aquarius tattoo still glowing along with his Fairy Tail guild mark.

"Wha-? Wh-What are you?" Bora asked, his voice quivering from fear.

"I'm Natsu Dragneel, the Fire Dragon-Devil Slayer!" he shouted, his right hand igniting in orange flame, his left igniting in brilliant white. A few people reacted in the crowd upon seeing that. Natsu ran up to the spot where Bora was now standing and knocked both fists into his gut, leaving the faker's back against the wooden deck. Everyone flinched when the impact made a shockwave and an explosion the size of a house that knocked the sideways ship back into the sea, submerging the nearly dead Bora in water and splitting the boat into two halves.

Everyone was silent now, with Natsu running to burn the ropes off of Lucy and the rest of the girls there. A few minutes later, after he had successfully done so, he noticed Bora's lifeless body wash up on shore, then groaned as he coughed up water and blood, only to smirk cockily as the Royal Guard put Bora's hands behind his back and handcuffed him in special cuffs (which were glowing). After they dragged him away, they started asking around for what happened, which the crowd told them, leaving Natsu to laugh victoriously and turn to his friends.

"Hey, guys, that was awesome! Man, that felt good!" he boasted. His expression changed to that of confusion when he noticed that Kai, Jellal, Elfman, Layla, Gray, Lyon, Ur, Carla, and Wendy looked away from his front. He looked to Lucy behind him and noticed her deep red blush (and not the fact that she was practically paralyzed in embarrassment and looking at him like he just admitted to doing something weird). "What's wrong?" he asked.

"...Natsu, your clothes," Cana informed him, using a similar tone to what she used when the Ice group would strip (she was still looking at him, apparently not fazed at seeing a naked man).

Natsu looked down and immediately covered his privates. Then he looked at Cana in comical anger. "Don't lump me in with Popsicle over there!" he shouted indignantly.

Gray only shouted back at him, still looking away, "What'd you say, Flamebrain?!"

"Ahh! Gray-san, my ear!" Wendy whined.

"Oh, sorry, Wendy," he apologized.

Cana laughed, Ultear sighed with familiarity (she was NOT dreamy about seeing him naked... she says), Yuki giggled, Levy was as red as an inside-out cadaver (a little morbid, but I'm just trying not to say 'red as a tomato'. If you have any ideas please feel free to tell me... and no, I don't know what the inside of a cadaver looks like...), Happy looked around wearing a confused look on his face, and Mirajane smiled and said, "Oh my." While Cana was laughing her head off, Ultear quickly looked around and then waved her hand, which restored his clothes back to their old state. '...It's times like this where the Arc of Time actually comes in handy,' she mused.

"Ahh. Back in my old clothes. Thank you, Ultear," Natsu said.

"Sure. Guys, you can look now. He's decent," Ultear informed them.

Everyone else looked back to the now-clothed Dragon Slayer. "That was fast," Wendy commented, holding Carla in her hands.

Natsu turned around and burned the ropes off the rest of the girls, also ungagging them. Once he did that, Ultear gathered them all up and informed them of their being "enchanted," so to speak, by the illegal Charm Magic, knocked out cold by Sleep Magic, and almost being sold into slavery, which none of them reacted very well to. The Royal Guard came over to ask the former captives and Ultear what happened (since Ultear seemed to have the whole picture). That left Natsu and the rest of the group (minus one) to look back to Lucy.

"Umm... thank you, Natsu. It was nice of you to save me," she said awkwardly.

"Huh? It wasn't just me. Me, Wendy, Happy, and Carla just got here first, and everyone else got here after us," Natsu corrected.

"Oh. Well, thank you, all of you," she turned to the rest of the group.

"Anytime, Lu-chan," Levy smiled, still blushing lightly.

"Ultear, you almost ready?" Natsu shouted to her.

"I'm coming," Ultear replied, jogging to join the group and eventually arriving.

"Alright, let's go," Natsu stated, causing the group to walk along the beach towards their eventual destination, the train...

However, he was holding Lucy's hand and dragging her along, which she instantly asked about. "M-Me too? Where are we going?" she asked.

"You wanted to join Fairy Tail, right? We can ask the Master together. Let's go!" Natsu smiled, grinning that big cheesy grin. They didn't stop walking.

Lucy's confused frown bent into a happy gasp, then a satisfied smile. Then she stopped being dragged along by Natsu at the back of the group and started running with them. She was smiling at Natsu, while Layla was on his other side, smiling at her daughter's happiness. Her gaze then turned to Aquarius, who didn't return to the Celestial Spirit World yet (why this was so confused her, but Layla ignored it), then forward. 'I guess I'm asking him about the Aquarius thing later then,' she mused, facing forward to walk with her friends.

* * *

"Ah, here it is."

As you may have guessed, they found it. It took them a while to get to it, but they did it. They arrived in front of the Fairy Tail guild hall and pushed open the doors.

"Yo, everyone! We're back!" Natsu shouted.

"Ah, Natsu. Where did you go?" asked Max, who walked over to the group from his table close to the aisle alongside Warren.

"I went to some place called... 'Whore Gin' or something-"

"It's 'Hargeon'," Levy corrected quietly, blushing a little.

"-and I beat up some guy that was pretending to be me. He got hauled off by the Royal Guard!" Natsu finished.

"Why'd you do that? What did he do with your name?" asked a confused Warren.

"He used Natsu's name to draw a crowd, then he used the illegal Magic 'Charm' along with Sleep Magic to draw a crowd of girls and kidnap them to sell them into slavery," Ultear explained.

"...Except that he probably won't be moving for a while. Natsu blew him up naked," Cana added.

"N-Naked?" Max asked blankly.

Ultear rolled her eyes and sighed familiarly. "The guy used Fire Magic to try and hurt Natsu, but..."

Warren chuckled. "...but we all know how that ends," he finished.

"Right. Of course, besides his body, only his scarf is fireproof, so I had to repair his clothes," Ultear added.

"Well, that explains why he looks totally unhurt," Max chimed in. He then turned to the two unfamiliar faces. "And who might you two be?" he asked politely, smiling.

"Oh, I'm Lucy," the girl introduced.

"I'm her mom, Layla," Layla added.

"I can see the resemblance," Warren noted, a drop of blood on his face, causing Lucy to instinctually try to punch him, only for Warren to take a step back, flinch, turn his face away, protect his face, and say quickly, "I'm sorry! It won't happen again!" without getting even a tap. Layla and Ur merely chuckled at her antics.

"What's so funny?" Ultear asked, and no, she was actually curious, not sarcastic.

"Oh, nothing. It's just that... well, seeing Lucy react reminded me of when you were that age. Good times," Ur reminisced.

"I didn't punch strangers for being perverted..." Ultear argued.

"I'm not perverted!" Warren protested.

"And I don't punch strangers!" Lucy chimed in. Layla started chuckling elegantly.

"You and I will get along very well, Ur," Layla commented.

Cana cleared her throat. "Anyway, why don't Lucy and her mom come with me and Natsu to join the guild, if you guys want to?" she advised. Warren, Max, and most of the group took their leave, leaving Natsu, Ultear, Layla, Lucy, Kai, and Cana.

"Sounds good to me!" Lucy affirmed.

"I do wonder how it will feel, being in a Mages' guild after so long..." Layla mused, smiling.

"Wait, you're a Mage too, Layla?" Cana asked.

"Yes. I am also a Celestial Spirit Mage, like my daughter. However, I entrusted the keys for my three spirits to three of my servants, who should have given them to Lucy once she was ready. I don't know where the key for Capricorn is, but she did receive the other two keys, so I am glad for that. Either way, I no longer possess the keys I would use to summon my Spirits, so I cannot summon them," Layla explained.

"It's a long story," a voice behind her told her. He sounded a little odd, though... like his voice was closer to the ground than it should've been. Everyone looked at him and noticed something that got them as shocked as hell.

"A... cat?" Lucy noted.

"Where did Kai go?" Layla wondered.

"Woof," he spoke, which caught them off guard.

"It sounds like a dog!" Cana noted.

"You guys didn't notice me this whole time? I've been a cat since the train," the cat spoke again, looking on them with judgmental eyes (or they _would_ have been, except he was a cat). He was a black cat with odd purple eyes, which you don't find everyday in cats.

"Wait, I thought you guys could tell Kai turned himself into a cat..." Natsu said confused, causing the others (minus the cat, of course) to stare at him.

"How would you know that is Kai? You were nearly puking the whole time," Ultear mused.

"Getting back on topic," Kai said, "Layla, Capricorn's key is with Capricorn right now. Zoldeo died recently, sadly, and Capricorn hasn't released his key into the world again yet."

"What? Zoldeo died?" Layla asked, concerned for her dead servant.

"Yeah. Struck by black lightning four times in half a second... I feel kinda sorry for him," Kai explained.

 _Mental Flashback_

 _"Hahahahaha! Die, Zoldeo! Oh, man, I am SO glad the Celestial Spirit King asked me to kill him! I feel kinda bad for him, but then I remember he nearly got Capricorn killed by breaking that taboo and I don't feel so sorry for him."_

 _Back to the present_

"Well, now I wish I could've talked to him. He must be going through some pain right now," Layla sympathized.

"I will be okay, Lady Layla."

Layla spun around to see a smiling anthropomorphic goat in a suit and tie wearing sunglasses.

"Capricorn! How did you get here?" Layla asked.

A familiar figure came out from behind him. "That would be my doing."

"Loke!" Natsu greeted, smiling.

"Who are you?" Layla asked.

"Ah, pardon me, Mrs. Heartfillia. You look lovely today. My name is Leo the Lion, but you may call me Loke. I lead the Zodiac Celestial Spirits. I summoned myself and brought Capricorn with me. He wanted to get the formalities out of the way and make a contract with Lucy since Zoldeo... well, you know," Loke explained.

"You summoned yourself? How?" Layla asked.

"I'm the only one who can do that. But I think Virgo stole my technique... Anyway, Capricorn, if you would..."

"Nice to see you too, Loke," Kai said with mock hurt, causing him to backpedal in surprise.

"Wait... Kai, is that you?" he asked.

"Yep. I'm a cat now," Kai answered, smiling.

"But why?" Loke asked, now composed.

"Hmm... you know, I think it was just because I felt like it. I'm too lazy to remember why," Kai answered.

"Your impulses are remarkably odd," Layla remarked.

"Oh, you don't know the half of it! For example, there is Yuki, behind you. Step aside and watch what happens," Kai told her. They did as he said and, sure enough, there was Yuki, who looked at Kai and instantly shrunk in a poof of smoke. Once the smoke cleared, she was a golden retriever. She started running towards Kai, barking at him, while he started running. Once Yuki got about a meter away, though, she turned back to the group and smiled a weird dog smile.

"I'll be right back. I have a cat to chase." And with that comment, she was off, chasing the cat out into the town. The group looked out the door for a minute, sweat-dropping, before Loke asked Capricorn to once again resume the making of the contract.

:::::::::::::

I have no idea why, but I felt like putting a cat-dog symbiotic relationship in there somewhere and there it is.

Layla(bot): Your impulses are remarkably odd.

Your point being...?

Layla(bot): You are weird.

Wow, why did I make this thing? It looks like the real Layla, but then you hear her craziness and... *sigh* I'm going to go burn it now.

Layla(bot): You cannot. I am a cat now.

Aw shut it. You may be a lady, but I made you. If you can't shut your mouth when I ask you to, life will be unpleasant for you. Besides, you don't possess Magic.

Layla(bot): I am a cat now. You cannot burn me.

...

...

...

Come here...

Oh, bye readers. I'm going to sit on this rocking chair and read a book with the cat on my lap (or, more notably, a fanfiction). Please vote in the poll on my profile page (7 unique voters and hopefully more later).


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